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Volvo C30 Polestar Concept hits the 'Ring

It's been over three years since the Volvo C30 Polestar Concept was unveiled, driven by journalists and, as it turns out, lapped around the Nürburgring with Scandinavian Touring Car Championship driver Robert Dahlgren behind the wheel. For whatever reason, the video of the 'Ring track session was only published by the tuning company yesterday. (Another discrepancy: Did Polestar's C30 lose 46 horsepower somewhere along the line? Because the video states that it has 405 hp, while the company's website quotes 451 hp...)
Whatever the case, the tuned Volvo is a beast, much more so than the similar-looking, 250-hp 2013 Volvo C30 Polestar Limited Edition that was sold last year. With 451 hp (sounds better than 405 hp, doesn't it?), all-wheel drive, limited-slip differentials front and rear and Öhlins dampers, the Polestar Concept checks all of the right boxes for us.
For some reason, the video, which you can watch below, seems a bit vanilla to us. Perhaps the overly dramatic music takes away from the action and the beautiful sounds of the turbocharged five-cylinder engine?

Junkyard Gem: 1997 Volvo V90

Volvo's "Brick Era" of squared-off rear-wheel-drive machines lasted from the debut of the 144 in 1966 all the way through the 900 Series cars of the 1990s, with the wildly successful 240 being the most iconic of the breed on our shores. The final chapter of the Swedish Brick saga came in the 1997 and 1998 model years, when the 960 sedan and wagon were rebadged as the S90 and V90, respectively. Here's one of those cars, a refrigerator-colored (and refrigerator-shaped) V90 wagon that got forcibly retired after a crash in Northern California. Volvo revived the V90 name in 2016, and you can buy a new V90 right now if you so choose. Today's Junkyard Gem, however, is the culmination of four decades of improvement to the original 140 design (itself based on much of the Amazon's chassis features and sharing plenty of components with the 1940s-era PV Series cars), while the current V90 comes straight out of the 21st century. I've been going out of my way to document just about every discarded 140 and 240 wagon I find, with some 740s and 940s mixed in. Many Volvo longroof owners still maintain a fanatical devotion to the rear-wheel-drive bricks, and I've found some of these cars in junkyards with impressively high final odometer readings. The fuel-efficiency and interior-space limitations of the old-timey brick design kept 960 sales lower than those of their predecessors, though, and I haven't met any 960 owners who share the level of devotion that 145 and 245 owners lavish on their cars. This car just squeaked past 150,000 miles during its 24 years on the road. The body and interior look to have been in very nice condition, showing that meticulous owners took good care of this car throughout its life, but then it got T-boned on the right side. This sort of damage isn't worth fixing on a quarter-century-old European wagon, and so here it sits. This engine compartment looks very similar to that of the old 240, though this modern 3.0-liter, DOHC straight-six and its 181 horses runs counter to the super-sensible spirit of most of those 1970s Goteborg bricks. The 960 was far more plush than its ancestors, and priced accordingly. In 1997, this car's list price started at $35,850 (about $60,660 in 2021 dollars). By comparison, a new 1975 245 wagon had an MSRP of $5,795 (about $29,940 today).

Volvo, Polestar reportedly planning twin city-friendly electric SUVs

Volvo is nearly ready to unveil the next generation of the XC90, its flagship model, but it's not forgetting about the other end of its range. It's reportedly planning to launch an entry-level model that will take the form of a pocket-sized crossover powered by an electric drivetrain. Without citing sources, British magazine Autocar reported that the model will ride on a modular platform developed by Volvo parent company Geely and called SEA internally. This architecture already underpins the 001 sold by Zeekr, which is another brand in the Geely empire. No technical specifications are available at this point, but the report sketches the outline of a high-riding model with a sleek-looking silhouette. This isn't the first time we've heard about Volvo's city-friendly SUV; earlier rumors claimed it would be called XC20 or C20, names that would have clearly signaled the model's positioning as being below the 40-badged cars. Volvo is moving away from this naming system, however, and the cars it will launch in the coming years will receive actual names. With that said, both the XC20 and the C20 names are off the table. Polestar's take on the concept of an electric entry-level crossover will be positioned between the 2 and the 3, though it will somewhat confusingly be called 4. It sounds like the model will be bigger and more expensive than Volvo's, and Autocar learned that it could be closely related to the C40 Recharge (pictured) underneath the sheetmetal. If that's accurate, it will share its CMA architecture with the 2, among other models, and it will be offered with either a single electric motor that zaps the front wheels or dual-motor all-wheel-drive. Both EVs will have at least one thing in common: a mission to boost sales. For Volvo, launching a battery-powered car pegged near the bottom of its range will increase the percentage of EVs in its global sales mix. It's planning to cross the 50% mark by 2025. For Polestar, entering cheaper segments will allow it to boost its annual sales by reaching less affluent buyers, though it will remain a premium brand. Polestar 4 is tentatively due out in 2023. There's no word on when Volvo will release its smallest EV to date.