I was messing around in an TAS editor to achieve the Fastest Mario and Rad-Racer and i found some interesting things which i haven't seen being discussed. Mainly about how to ACTUALLY have a perfect Rad-Racer.

Mario: You can actually achieve 12 coins from the multi-coin block instead of 11, this is something that has been known in the SMB1 community for years but has not found it's way to NWC '90 because it is not humanly possible. It requires 11 frame perfect jumps and has 0 frames of wiggleroom for errors. But this can be done in a TAS which pushes the 50-coin TAS down to 44s150ms, two whole seconds faster than the WR:[] There is a way to achieve 12 coins from the multi coin block in a RTA setting but the setup requires you to atleast hit 4-5 frame perfect jumps in a row and it's barely even faster than the standard method, if not slower

Rad-Racer:

1. The game only pulls inputs every other frame, meaning that 1 frame inputs are quite easy, and there is an element of luck whether your inputs will be read the frame you press it or the frame after you press it. This also means that your inputs can be ignored if you press a button for only one frame.

2. the ending score in rad racer is directly correlated to how fast you ended the stage.

This is a very weird concept, the reason for this seems to be that: if you slow down more on the dirt before crashing into the tree you will reach 0 speed faster than if you were driving or accelerating at full speed into the tree.

I've messed around for many hours, messing with A releases, pressing B for breaking, and every right press input timing and have yet to find a single instance where the score doesnt correlate to the frame the "great Racing" message pops up.

(assuminga mario score of 10300) The score you normally encounter at the end of rad-racer will be 72250 to 72220. Ending the stage at 72220 will grant you the fastest segment, and each 10 points over 72220 adds an aditional frame until the "Great Racing" text pops up: here's the timetable using a framerate of 60.09881fps.

Score: 72260 --- 6653f / 60.09881 = 1m50s701ms (from holding up)

Score: 72250 --- 6652f / 60.09881 = 1m50s684ms

Score: 72240 --- 6651f / 60.09881 = 1m50s667ms* - official WR

Score: 72230 --- 6650f / 60.09881 = 1m50s651ms

Score: 72220 --- 6649f / 60.09881 = 1m50s634ms

(* thousands digit could be rounded up to 668)

i got the frame timings from seeing that frame 4832 is the first where you get control over the car and tire smoke shows(in my TAS) and frame 11481 is the fastest you can end the stage at (in my TAS). leading to 11481-4832 = 6649 frames of Rad-Racer.

This part is only applicable to Rad-Racer only speedruns.

The frame when the timer should start is a bit vaguely specified in the rules, it states that :

"Timing starts when the car begins to move and ends when the "Great Racing" on the blue score screen fully loads."

This is because there isn't one specific frame where the car "begins to move" In this post i've assumed that the start of Rad-Racer is the frame you get control of the car and tire-smoke is seen, but you can also start timing a few frames later.

it takes 2 frames to show the speed increasing from 0 km/h -> 16 km/h and 4 frames for the car to visually move a pixel after getting control of the car.

all three points can be argued as when the car "begins to move" but ultimately its not too important because of this being a small side-category.

Regardless of timing method. The times in the Rad-Racer only category can likely be beaten easily with this knowledge.

here is a video explaining the Rad racer tas' beginingand end sections and timings