what a great video game, could be useful if u found the reasoning for it

This glitch has been known about for a while I think (doesn't help any of the categories as far as I can tell, but I'm not entirely sure since I don't run this game).

Basically that happens is the game is asking for 4 gems, however (due to a glitch) it's actually only looking for the blue gem (notice how the colour of the gem never changes from blue on the gate). I have no idea about why or how this happens, but I'm not aware of glitch happening anywhere else.

I know it's not a great source, but here's where I found that https://www.gamefaqs.com/ps2/914685-crash-nitro-kart/cheats

From what I understand, in any% you don't need to do gems and second visit to the hyper spaceway, and for 101% you need to get all the gems anyway, so I'm not sure it would help.

Sorry I haven't been particularly helpful, just passing on what I know :) Good find though!