Meet This Year's Chonky Champion of Fat Bear Week: Backpack, a Laid-Back 20-Year-Old Male Who's a 'Stoic Presence on the River'

As a cub, Backpack liked to cling to his mother’s back as she swam across the Brooks River in Alaska’s Katmai National Park and Preserve. These days, Backpack is all grown up—and he’s considerably heavier. He’s so big, in fact, that he was crowned the champion of this year’s Fat Bear Week on September 29.

Backpack—a 20-year-old gentle giant known officially as 89—beat out an adult female named 910 to win the annual online tournament, which pits brown bears head-to-head in a single-elimination, bracket-style contest. In the end, Backpack won with 103,344 votes, compared to 910’s 98,253. Backpack first came on the scene in 2006, when his mother Holly—who won Fat Bear Week in 2019—brought him to the Brooks River.

As the duo swam across the waterway, the youngster had a habit of climbing on top of Holly, which is how he got his nickname. In 2007, Backpack returned to the river as a yearling with a bad leg injury, which made park staffers concerned about his survival prospects. However, he pulled through and ultimately struck out on his own, separating from Holly in 2008.

Today, he’s a medium-large bear with blond ears who weighs between 1,000 and 1,200 pounds. His fur tends to be light brown early in the summer, transforming into a darker, grizzled brown hue by fall. People have watched him his whole life.” Backpack has relatively few visible wounds and scars for his size and age, which might reflect his unflappable demeanor.

His body size suggests that the strategy works.” He’s known for perching on a rock in the middle of the river, downstream of the falls, where he patiently fishes for salmon. He holds his own very quietly.” Fat Bear Week, which started in 2014, celebrates the estimated 2,200 brown bears that live in Katmai National Park and Preserve, which spans more than four million acres on the Alaska Peninsula. The annual contest also serves as a fundraiser for the Katmai Conservancy, the park’s nonprofit partner.

After watching livestreams of the bears feeding at Brooks Falls and comparing before-and-after photos from the beginning and end of summer, fans vote for their favorite chunky bear. This year, for the first time, the contest included bear families. Organizers also added four additional bears to the bracket, expanding the initial field from 12 to 16.