This is simply asked because I've heard this information and have been told myself that my MK8 speedrun isn't a speedrun because it's a racing game lol.

I think some can be. As long as it's not going in a straight line, then I think it could be. MK8 has a lot of shortcuts and optimizations, and I think as long as you can optimize for the fastest time, it can be considered a speedrun.

ive never heard anyone say that. people who do time trials (at least in the mk community) mostly call themselves "time trialers" instead of speedrunners but the time trialing is definetly speedrunning. as speedrunning is: "complete a task in a video game with the intent to be as fast as possible" and time trialing is literally that. you try to complete the time trial as fast as possible thus its speedrunning but since the community is somewhat different to the "actual speedrunning" community its safer to say time trialing is a subgenre of speedrunning

I say it is speedruning because you are trying to beat it fast and racing games have stuff which can increase your speed and make it faster

The point of a racing game is to go fast. That’s also the definition of Speedrunning.

@Act_ is right, Also you don't compete against the computer only you also compete with other Speedrunners as well.

IMO this is due to the fact that most speedruns usually break the game through glitches or just skip developer intended experience by going too fast, because even if you go full glitchless the length of the game can get cut massively, so a speedrun is something unusual. For most racing games, going as fast as possible IS the only option really and is the intended way, so when you speedrun them, it can be hard to tell it apart from a usual, if very skilled gameplay, especially if there is no ai opponents and/or rng elements and it's just you vs track. I ofc don't agree with the notion that racing games don't count as speedrunning, just trying to explain the logic behind such statements.