Fat Bear Week is back, and the internet is already lining up behind its favorite salmon-stuffed heavyweights. Katmai National Park in Alaska is once again hosting the online bracket where brown bears face off for the title of supreme chonk, and the competition is stacked—literally.

The annual contest began nearly a decade ago when park officials installed live cams along the Brooks River, home to one of the richest sockeye salmon runs on Earth. What started as a tool to study individual bears quickly morphed into an international spectacle. More than a million people across 100 countries now cast votes each October, all to honor the bear that best “exemplifies fatness and success,” according to Katmai.

These animals eat with purpose. Brown bears can lose up to a third of their body weigh

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