I drifted a Polestar 3 EV across a frozen Swedish lake for science

Located just above the Arctic Circle and with a population of fewer than 3,000 people, you would be forgiven for not knowing much about the Swedish town of Jokkmokk. It’s a two-hour drive north of Luluå, a larger town that’s an hour’s flight from Stockholm, but that's also unlikely to have troubled your radar. Kayaking is popular here in the summer, while hardy winter tourists come for week-long dog sled expeditions without a hotel in sight. The past winter saw temperatures in Jokkmokk fall to -40C, which, as convenient as it is weird, is also -40F.

I’m here, on a positively balmy (-15C) Tuesday in late February, as one of the first journalists to drive the new Polestar 3 electric vehicle. But instead of a marathon drive back to the UK, I’ll be sticking to the ice. I’m here to learn how the electric motors and enormous brains of new cars are designed and programmed to deal with slippery roads in ways internally combusted cars cannot.

Polestar engineers and test drivers have spent the last two months up here, braving the conditions and forgetting what paved roads look like, to fine-tune the 3 before it goes on sale later in 2024. They were here last year too, and they’ll be back again when the snow returns in early December.

Winter testing like this is a common part of car development, with manufacturers flocking to Swedish Lapland every year in massive numbers. The better-known town of Arjeplog – where I experienced the Jaguar Ice Academy last winter – is where most companies go, filling every hotel room, keeping the pizzerias in business and trying to avoid snowmobile-riding automotive paparazzi from snapping their camouflaged prototypes. In Jokkmokk, 120 miles to the north-east, things are much quieter.

Here, Swedish carmaker Polestar has exclusive use of a lake, onto which it has carved the ‘Joakim-ring’, a complex made up of three distinct tracks designed by chief test driver, Joakim Rydholm. Before we journalists arrived, Joakim and his colleagues spent weeks sliding around in a bid to hone the Polestar 3’s driving dynamics, as well as its traction control and stability system. It’s also a handy place to make sure the doors don’t freeze shut overnight and the heated seats are up to the job.

Ice driving helps test and calibrate stability systems in extreme conditions, but it also lets engineers look at the Polestar 3’s driving dynamics in slow motion. This is because, when a car loses traction and begins to slide on ice, wearing studded tyres, it does so more slowly than on dry tarmac, giving engineers a better understanding of what’s going on and how to tweak the setup.

Before we get to the fun – I mean, sliding the car in a controlled and scientific manner – let's have a quick look at the Polestar 3 itself.

This is Polestar’s third car, obviously, and its first E-segment SUV. What that means in plain English is, Polestar sees the 3 going up against cars like the Porsche Cayenne and BMW iX; full-size SUVs with bags of performance and, in the case of the Cayenne, arguably the best driving dynamics in the segment. Priced from £79,900, the Polestar 3 is a dual-motor, all-wheel-drive EV producing 360 kW (483 bhp), accelerating to 60 mph in 4.9 seconds and with a claimed range of up to 390 miles from its 11 kWh battery and 400-volt system architecture. “Preliminary data” from Polestar suggests the battery will charge from 10 to 80% in 30 minutes when plugged into a 250 kW DC charger, or from zero to full in 11 hours using an 11 kW AC home charger.

This being Polestar, a slightly sportier version called the ‘Performance pack’ and priced at £85,500 sees its power increased to 380 kW (510 bhp) and torque jumps from an already-potent 840 Nm (619 ft-lbs) to a massive 910 Nm, or 671 ft-lbs. This lowers the 0-60 mph sprint to 4.6 seconds and the range falls to 348 miles, while the 130 mph top speed remains unchanged. Opting for the Performance pack increases wheel size from 21 inches to 22, introduces a sportier ‘Polestar Engineered’ chassis and instals gold seat belts that look a lot better than they sound.

The 3 is Polestar’s largest car to date, but aims to retain the brand’s sporty driving dynamics with a lower seating position than you’d expect from an SUV of this size. This is accentuated by the large wheels, relatively shallow glass house, steeply raked windscreen and sloping roofline. The overall effect is a car that looks smaller than it is, but context is tricky to find on a massive frozen lake with no other vehicles in sight.

Speaking of the lake, it’s time to learn all about the 3’s stability system and clever torque vectoring.

At first I drive with the system fully switched on. The studded tyres serve up a decent amount of traction, while the car’s stability control gently intervenes to help you continue in your chosen direction, instead of immediately cutting all power the moment a fraction of wheelspin is detected. It’s a neat demonstration of how far these systems have come since the early, somewhat more binary days of electronic traction and stability control.

It isn’t groundbreaking though, so I soon switch the driving mode from Comfort to Performance. The safety systems remain in place, but now I’m on a longer leash and torque vectoring is enabled. Now, when the car detects wheelspin as I accelerate through a corner, more torque is sent to the wheel with most grip, which due to weight transfer tends to be on the outside of the corner. The result is a moderate but neatly controlled slide that demonstrates how the car lets its driver continue to make good progress, while letting them know the safety net isn’t far away.

The system comprises an electric motor attached to the rear axle via a differential with dual clutch packs. These allow the motor’s full torque output to be distributed equally, or for all torque to go to just one of the rear wheels, or anything in-between. The rear motor can also be disengaged entirely, making the Polestar 3 front-wheel-drive when cruising to improve energy efficiency and extend battery life. Although such systems have appeared on some cars before, this is claimed to be the first use of such a differential on an EV.

Drifting a car is always satisfying when you get it just right, but torque vectoring like this takes things to another level. Polestar has judged this system and its intervention very well indeed, with only the slightest sense that a computer is keeping the car on course. It’s all rather flattering, but is also predictable in its execution. I’m never left to second-guess what the computers are about to do; if I’m about to be confronted by a massive dose of unruly oversteer, or if the power will be cut at any moment. It lets you make good progress, even while sliding on ice.

This all adds up to demonstrate what’s possible with the big torque and fine precision of an electric motor. And, while I didn’t head off-road (or indeed off-ice) during my time with the Polestar 3, the technology should prove useful on rough terrain. Here, torque would be pushed to the wheel with the most grip, or taken away if not in contact with the ground.

After a whole day of driving across all three test tracks, I feel I’ve got the hang of the Polestar 3. With all of the safety systems enabled it feels properly surefooted. But with the systems relaxed and torque vectoring switched on, it gives its driver a huge amount of confidence. And even with the stability control disabled the car clearly has the sort of neutral but communicative balance that exudes a sense of having been set up properly. You can thank the Polestar engineers who have spent two winter seasons and many weeks above the Arctic Circle for that.

What else? These are pre-production prototypes, so I can’t dig too deeply into the details. But I can say the low seating position makes the 3 feel smaller and more nimble than you might expect. The interior looks and feels good, although anyone upgrading from a Polestar 2 will wonder where some of that car’s physical controls have gone. It’s a decent infotainment system though, built on Android Automotive and with a big, 14.5in touchscreen that is as bright and sharp as it is responsive.

I still wish car makers would bring back physical controls for the climate, steering wheel and side mirror adjustment – all of which are missing from the 3 – and remove touch-sensitive buttons on steering wheels, while they’re at it. But at least Polestar has had the sense to fit a driver display behind the wheel and not relegate the speedometer to the central screen, as seen on the Tesla Model 3/Y and Volvo EX30.

I’m a big fan of the panoramic glass roof, and there’s a good amount of space across both rows of seats. Nice level of refinement too, and the same Scandi-cool styling with which drivers of recent Polestars and Volvos will be familiar.

Although the 3 and £60,000 Polestar 4 haven’t arrived as quickly as the company might have hoped, Polestar now has a huge year ahead of it. The coming months will see it evolve from a one-car startup with an unfamiliar badge to a manufacturer producing three distinct vehicles. These will quickly be followed by the Polestar 5, a six-figure, four-door GT with the Porsche Taycan in its sights, and the 6, a stunning convertible sports car due in 2026.