This seems like uncharted waters.

There are lots of cases where there are exploitable factors in racing games. Off the top of my head...

1. Prolonged rocket boost (PRB) in Mario Kart DS... if you get a perfect start at the race line and hit nonstop mini-turbos, you can ride across all terrain (grass, sand, etc.) with no slow down.

2. Zig-zag mini-turbos in Mario Kart Super Circuit... if you push back and forth fast enough on the d-pad, you can charge mini-turbos by sliding in both directions rather than a single direction, as originally intended.

3. Snaking and space-flight in F-zero GX.

In most of these cases, competitive time trial fan sites made "split tables" for folks that did or did not want to use the exploit. This allowed folks to participate in the way they choose-- many folks play both ways.

The difference is that now, with digital distribution, developers can repeatedly patch their games to fix potential exploits or even alter ship stats or course features. So as is the case with the B-S-B, time trials records that were set in the past may not be comparable to those set now

Personally, I think it SUCKS to have key features of a racing game changed after its initial release. I totally understand why it makes sense from a developer/publisher/marketer perspective. But it really eliminates the "level playing field" that home consoles previously provided to gamers.