Why a distance runner-gone-viral is intently following UNC-Clemson football

When North Carolina football lost 48-14 to TCU in the season opener, Chase Bandolik didn’t hurl a remote at the TV or complain on X. Instead, he hopped on his treadmill at 11 p.m. and ran 34 miles — one for each point in UNC’s final deficit — through the night. He finished around 5 a.m., grabbed some water and headed straight into work.

“They were all joking the next day,” Bandolik said of his coworkers. “Like, ‘Oh boy, you really got let down last night.”

Bandolik, a 29-year-old gym owner and trainer from Illinois isn’t a UNC fan. He’s not a Southerner, either. But he’s turned football heartbreak into his own personal endurance test and shared his journey with more than 127,000 followers on social media. The videos capturing his UNC-TCU challenge — and ensuing pain — earned more than 94,000 likes on Instagram and 255,000 views on TikTok.

Saturday, with Dabo Swinney and the 1-3 Clemson Tigers coming to Chapel Hill to face Bill Belichick’s 2-2 squad, Bandolik is once again putting his legs on the line. For every point by which the Tar Heels lose, Bandolik has pledged to run a mile.

“It’s always fun just to add the running component,” Bandolik said. “It makes me even more invested in the game. So it’s just kind of a fun spin.”

Bandolik began this challenge as a way to cope as a Chicago Bears fan. Frustrated by repeated losses and the negative feelings that followed, Bandolik, a former college football player at Illinois Wesleyan, decided to channel his energy into something positive after each game.

“I always felt down after the game,” Bandolik said. “So I’m like, ‘OK, how could I have a little bit better of a feeling?’ And something I enjoy doing is running.”

The postgame runs gave him a better outlook and kept him engaged with the Bears, even amidst a losing season. The tradition expanded this year to include occasional college games, with Bandolik picking a matchup and adding his signature twist: running a mile for every point his chosen team loses by.

And so on Sept. 1, as UNC fans groaned through Belichick’s college debut on the sidelines, Bandolik prepared himself for an ultramarathon distance.

“I was telling my fiancee before the game, ‘Oh, this is gonna be great. I’m gonna get to watch the game and this one, they’re probably gonna win, so I won’t even have to run at all,’” Bandolik said, later adding, “And as the game was going on, she kept checking in on me, just like, ‘What is going on?’ I was like, ‘I have no clue.’”

Bandolik recorded parts of the season opener from his TV at home, narrating the UNC loss with an energy that gradually diminished as his cruel fate became more clear. When North Carolina scored its second touchdown, he added: “I needed that touchdown bad.”

The video then cut to Bandolik on his at-home treadmill, calling out every single mile as he logged his marathon effort — literally. His previous longest distance in a social media challenge was 28 miles, a mark bestowed upon him by a Bears loss last fall.

North Carolina football fans have been here plenty of times. Maybe not the distance runs, but the letdowns and the what-could-have-beens. The moments when the ceiling for a beloved team seemed low enough to bonk your head on.

Running after losses became Bandolik’s answer to the frustration he felt watching the Bears stumble. Instead of stewing, he hopped on his treadmill or a local trail.

“I was like, OK, I always feel good after a run,” Bandolik said. “So if I incorporate that into these games to where now, if they lose a lot, I’ll run a lot — and then I enjoy it — so I feel a lot better after the games.

It is sometimes rough if it’s a late game, and then it’s a lot more than you want to run, but it’s been just a fun way to keep me engaged.”

More than a personal challenge, Bandolik has become part of the growing online culture — or “memery” — surrounding UNC football, where fans poke fun at oddities and unexpected moments like a Ludacris concert rescheduled for 10 a.m. thanks to a noon kickoff. Whether it’s teams like UCF and TCU clowning the team and Belichick on social media or the thriving digital communities of the ACC (re: the “Calgorithm”), the thriving digital community brings a fun twist to following ACC football.

Bandolik’s running challenge, he hopes, will also give fans new ways to engage and make the quirky games and struggling teams worth showing up for.

“I’m like, ‘How can I make this more relatable for other people,’” Bandolik said. “But also, like, add in more misery to where they’re waiting till the end to see what happens.”

This story was originally published October 3, 2025 at 6:00 AM.