Pool stars and pole stars: Mondo and Sarah’s Paris edition Polestar 4s

Gold galore

No, you don’t have to be a superstar to drive our cars, but when a pole (vaulting) star and a pool star appreciate our brand and our products, it’s an opportunity for wordplay too good to pass up. Sarah Sjöström and Armand Duplantis have been friends of the brand since 2020, each driving a Polestar 2 – and enjoying every mile of it.

Mondo and Sarah might be described as the golden boy and golden girl of Swedish sports. With years of record-breaking accomplishments in the swimming and athletics arena respectively (and stacks and stacks of medals), Sarah and Mondo are nothing short of sporting royalty in Scandinavia's largest country. The Swedish king was so excited about their accomplishments in Paris that he called Sarah “a queen.” That’s a big deal, coming from the actual king of the nation.

Upon the athletes’ return from Paris, after a gold-studded summer, we wanted to celebrate our old friends with something special. Something we knew they liked to drive, in a colour they much prefer: a gold Polestar 4 – Paris edition, with personalised stickers. After a few photos and a bit of touching, feeling, and embracing their new rides, we caught up with Sarah and Mondo on the importance of performance and the joy of driving.  

Driving Polestar – the greatest escape

Sarah drives her Polestar 2 every day. Just like for many other Stockholmers, her days involve commuting for a good portion of the morning. Sarah’s office – the swimming pool – is located on the outskirts of Stockholm and the driving time is hers for relaxing (and the occasional in-car meeting). “I like to use the time in the car for recovery,” comments Sarah.

Mondo agrees that driving is a sacred time of the day. “I almost purposefully go train outside of the city, just to drive a little bit longer. I think it’s because I grew up in that type of environment, in the United States, where you have to drive to get to where you’re going,” explains Mondo. “Driving is probably the best escape from everything, especially when life gets more and more hectic.”

Beyond being a great escape from life’s pressures, both world champions enjoy the design language of Polestar. “It looks good, and I think it brings out a different type of confidence and swagger in you, which I think is very important,” says Mondo.  

The tangible and the talent

Look and feel may be as important in car aesthetics as it is in sports. Mondo tells us that he’s “not much of a numbers guy” when it comes to pole vaulting, rather, he relies heavily on his understanding and experience of the sport. “I go off feeling. It looks good, it feels good – then great. I go mostly off that,” he comments. “At the end of the day, that’s the most important thing – that intangible kind of feeling. That feeling of being connected to it.” To a layman, this sounds like the intangible mystery of raw talent, something that Mondo and Sarah possess in abundance.

Then there are the tangible, measurable things, that can make an athlete better. Like, time.

Sarah explains that the stopwatch is one of the most important things for her to improve as a swimmer. By competing with herself in training, Sarah can push herself to new heights. But when it comes to competing against others, there will always be that factor of uncertainty on whether her efforts will be enough. She tells us that one of the biggest challenges is mastering what she can control. “It takes so much more than just doing everything right in training. On race day, all factors must come together for it to work,” she concludes.

By all accounts, Sarah and Mondo handled the challenges of Paris masterfully. 

Polestar 4  

… And as for their first drives in their new rides, both Mondo and Sarah are planning to explore Stockholm’s archipelago in gold Polestar 4’s.

Want your own gold Polestar 4? Learn more about the electric SUV coupé here.