I'm sure somebody has the exact % of shield replenishment somewhere ,but roughly in order of most recharge value if absorbed would be: Plasma bolt,Missile,Rocket & Shield,Cannon,Turbo,Autopilot,Bomb & mines .
Not exact but pretty close.

Steering is slower than side shifting,put it that way.
Unlike previous wipeouts there is no advantage to pitching down on a flat section of track,a lot of the guys use motion control for pitch only so it has little to no effect on steering.

There are a few records that are glitched times in the single race records [also in Zone records] that have either never been corrected or have recently appeared due to some new glitch in the system.
These times are not possible in a real sense and should be disregarded.