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REDWOOD FALLS, Minn. (KMSP) - Teenagers do not often get enough credit for what they do right. Many are hardworking and responsible go-getters. Marshal Quast is one of those kids who had a crazy idea - to run across the state for charity. And he did it.
Minnesota is not exactly small, even if you're traveling west to east. So when Quast decided to run across the state, he knew it would take some time.
“It took me 21 days,” Quast said. “Five miles in the morning. Five miles at night.”
21 days was plenty of time to fill a teenager's modern day journal with plenty of content -- his Youtube channel is his own documentary.
After months of planning, Quast left for his run on July 4 in the western part of Minnesota near Ivanhoe and followed Highway 19 across the state to finish in Red Wing 212 miles later.
During his senior year of high school, the Redwood Falls teen decided he needed a challenge with a purpose and decided to fundraise for a nonprofit called Charity: Water.
“What really attracted me to their website was the fact that 100 percent of donations go to offering clean water to developing countries,” Quast told Fox 9.
To date, he has raised more than $5,000 for the charity.
And perhaps what surprised him was what he gained as well: a little perspective and a new love of his home state.
“When you're out on the road running you get more time to think to yourself, get more time to look at everything [and] take in the scenery around you,” Quast said.
Quast said his favorite stretch of the route was in Northfield, where he ran past the Malt-O-Meal factory.
“It smelled really good,” Quast said.
Along the way the teen would stay with friends or family and he always had someone following him in his family's suburban.
“I always had someone with me to move the car up as I ran so that I didn't have to walk back,” Quast said.
And as he heads off to college, he leaves with one big lesson under his belt: set a goal and achieve it.
Quast said he ran into a really hot stretch of weather in July, but otherwise said the running felt pretty good.