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Key Takeaways:
- Powerade focuses on moments of mental and physical preparation that happen before each competition begins.
- Rising football stars Lamine Yamal and Rodrygo Goes bring authenticity to the campaign through personal rituals rooted in their youth and heritage.
- Created by WPP Open X and led by Ogilvy, the campaign sets the stage for Powerade’s presence at major global sporting events over the next four years.
Power isn’t always found in motion — sometimes it’s in the stillness before the start of a game.
Powerade’s newest global campaign shines the spotlight on this moment.
Created by WPP Open X and led by Ogilvy, the “Pause is Power” platform taps two rising football stars, Lamine Yamal and Rodrygo Goes, to star in two inspiring hero films.
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The platform hopes to celebrate how intentional moments of pause help athletes fuel both their minds and bodies before hitting peak performance.
“With ‘Pause is Power,’ we continue to uncover new layers of meaning and beauty in what has become an expansive creative platform for Powerade,” Guillermo Vega, global creative network lead at Ogilvy, told DesignRush.
“This new work explores how athletes draw strength from moments of pause — using that time to reset, focus, and hydrate in preparation for a pivotal moment.
Lamine and Rodrygo bring this to life in a way that shows how greatness can be found in the pause, which is especially powerful as we want to share inspiring stories through our platform and build connections with communities around the world.”
Filmed with an eye for authenticity, the campaign highlights rituals that athletes use to tap into strength and focus.
Yamal draws power from his hometown of Rocafonda, while Rodrygo returns to his first love — futsal — for clarity and confidence.
“Powerade is all about what athletes do in the moment before they go out there, not just what happens during the game,” Yamal said a press release.
“For me, that means tapping into my roots."
Overall, this evolution of “Pause is Power” ensures the Coca-Cola brand stays deeply embedded in the rhythm of elite sport, all before the whistle even blows.
Creative agencies continue to help brands shift from spectacle to substance, building campaigns around emotional readiness and personal rituals instead of just performance highlights.
Where Preparation Meets Performance
In "The 304," one of the two spots, Yamal visualizes success while perched on a neighborhood wall in Rocafonda, the number itself referencing his childhood postal code.
It’s a grounded yet poetic nod to where his story began.
"Back to Rocafonda. Mataró. Where it all began. To the concrete. My court. To the graffiti that writes our story," the young athlete says in the spot.
Meanwhile, "My First Love," set to debut in May, follows Goes as he channels his early futsal days.
Here, he recalls agility, sharp thinking, and joy to prepare for the high-stakes intensity of professional football.
Both films position the brand as a key player in the athletes' pre-game preparation, reinforcing its role beyond the sidelines.
This latest campaign will roll out across global sporting events, including the FIFA World Cup 2026 and the LA 2028 Olympic Games.
Meanwhile, BODYARMOR recently rebranded with a modern aesthetic to stand out in the sports drink market.
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