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Sweden's Prince Carl Philip to race for Volvo in STCC

Prince Carl Philip Bernadotte has it good. He is a member of the Swedish Royal Family, he dates a model and he has been voted by Forbes as one of the "20 Hottest Young Royals." If that were not enough, he is a fairly successful racecar driver. The latter has earned him a spot on the Volvo Polestar racing team for the Swedish Touring Car Championship. The prince will be piloting a race-spec S60 in the 2013 STCC campaign.
Starting in 2008, Prince Carl Philip began competing in the Porsche Carrera Cup, where he placed as high as 11th. In 2010, he finished first in the Porsche GT3 Endurance competition, and most recently, he placed fourth in the 2012 Swedish GT GTB.
As his motorsport career up to this point suggests, the prince is quite serious about racing and the STCC is the next step up. According to Prince Carl Philip, "There is no tougher championship in Sweden and at the same time as I have respect for it, it motivates me greatly." You can read more on Prince Carl Philip's upcoming campaign with Polestar in the press release below.

Volvo recalls another 195,000 vehicles for airbags after a death

Volvo has recalled 194,546 vehicles built between 2001 and 2007 due to airbag inflators that "may explode during deployment, due to propellant degradation occurring after long-term exposure to high absolute humidity, high temperatures, and high temperature cycling." The vehicles included in this recall are V70 and XC70 models that were built from Feb. 22, 2000 through May 4, 2007, but similar recalls have included other Volvo models for the same issue. In total, Volvo has recalled more than half a million vehicles worldwide to replace faulty inflators. To find out if your vehicle has been recalled in the United States, visit the official site of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Owners can also contact Volvo Car customer service at 1-800-458-1552. The number for this particular recall is R10136. According to the recall notice, Volvo is aware of one incident in which an inflator ruptured, killing the driver. While these airbag recalls may sound familiar due to the massive number of inflators that were made by Takata and were recalled and replaced, the inflators used by Volvo were manufactured by supplier ZF/TRW. Takata's faulty airbag inflators have been blamed for at least 19 deaths in the United States and 28 worldwide, along with more than 400 injuries in the U.S. alone. Volvo will replace the driver-side airbag of affected vehicles at no charge "with a modern state-of-the-art propellant/inflator." Owners of affected vehicles should expect to receive a notice in the mail after December 14, 2021. Related video: This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings.

Volvo celebrates 20 years of sleeper wagons with 850 T-5R and V60 Polestar

I must have been around Bar Mitzvah age when I was in the back of my parents' car on the highway as we passed a truck full of Volvo 850 T-5R wagons - half of them in black, half in banana yellow. It was one of the coolest things I'd ever seen: a whole gaggle of sleeper power wagons that were infinitely cooler than whatever minivan we were riding in. Hard to believe that was 20 years ago, but it was. And Polestar is understandably keen to mark the anniversary of the first overt Volvo performance wagon.
While Volvo's racing partner hasn't released some commemorative edition to celebrate that prototypical sleeper, it has shot a special batch of photos of the T-5R (based on the 850 wagon internally known as the 855 for its five doors) alongside its modern successor, the V60 Polestar. The images shot in Huntington Beach, CA, only go to show how much has changed in the two decades that separate them.
Whereas this front-drive T-5R packed a turbocharged inline-five driving 240 horsepower through a four-speed automatic propel the yellow box to 62 in 7.0 seconds, the turbo six in the svelter, Rebel Blue-clad 2015 V60 Polestar churns out 350 hp to all four wheels through a six-speed auto for a 4.9-second sprint. That's the kind of progress we can get behind. In fact, it's the sort of progress that everyone can get behind, really, because chances are whatever you're driving will probably have a hard time keeping up.