He might've enabled Fast Disc Speed but I could be wrong.

Yes, I play on a PS2 with fast disc speed enabled. Also if I recall correctly, if you have a black label version of the game it might run slower. Cyberdemon531 may be able to confirm.

I don't know what model she uses, but I use a 90k with fast disc speed personally, some games can be scratched and also cause slower loading times, too. 90k PS2s are typically the fastest model, so if you don't have one you should hit it up.