Advocate Spotlight: Kyle Rust

When I was 22 years old, a doctor listened to my heart during a routine physical and heard something that shouldn’t have been there. A murmur. Something that wasn’t present the year before. It had crept in quietly, the way heart conditions sometimes do — no symptoms, no warning signs, no pain. Just a sound that didn’t belong, found only because someone was listening for it.

I was an athlete my entire life. I grew up playing sports, pushing my body, trusting it completely. When in what should have been the prime of my physical life, I learned my heart was failing. If that screening hadn’t been ordered during a routine physical, I would have never known. I would have kept going — kept training, pushing, and trusting a body that was quietly turning against me — until one day I would have fallen over dead. Maybe on a field. Maybe on a run. Maybe just walking to class.

That is why yearly physicals matter. They matter when you’re eight, and when you’re twenty-two. They matter when you’re playing competitive sports, and they matter when you’re not.

I’m alive today because of amazing doctors, proactive heart screenings, and medical care that caught my murmur before it was too late. That’s the difference between a story that ends and a story that keeps going. One screening. One physical. One doctor who was paying attention.

I carry a scar on my chest from my open-heart surgery. For a long time, I didn’t talk about it. But somewhere along the way, I stopped seeing it as a wound and started seeing it as proof. Proof that a broken heart can keep going. That a broken heart can keep fighting.

After my surgery, in my darkest hour, my dogs, Moose and Maverick, were the reasons I kept going. On the days I couldn’t find a reason to lace up, they gave me one. They are my pack. Heart & Hound is what we call it.

On November 21, 2026, I’m going to start running in Strunk, Kentucky, at the Tennessee border. I’ll run north along US Route 27 for five days — 205 miles — through 19 communities across 10 counties. Somerset. Nicholasville. Lexington. Cynthiana. Falmouth. Small towns and big towns, back roads and main streets. I’ll finish on November 25 at Tower Park in Fort Thomas — less than a mile from where I grew up. My parents will be there every mile, crewing from a support van. Moose and Maverick will be running alongside me the whole way.

This is not just a run through Kentucky, but a run for the hearts of Kentucky. This is about awareness, advocacy, and community.

So, here’s what I’m really asking: Come run with me. If I’m passing through your town, come out and run a mile. Or two. Or ten. Do as much as you can. Show up. Be part of this. And when you do — run for someone. Run for the athlete who collapsed on the field and never got back up. Run for the survivor who is still here and still fighting. Run for your brother, your sister, your teammate, your student. A mile for mine. A mile for yours. 205 miles for all of them.

The run starts November 21. But the movement starts now. This heart has a story. This heart has a mission. And it’s going home — one mile at a time.