yo, I would like to start off this with saying that i despise shfiting sand lands in all shapes or forms. this level is actual hot garbage. let's start off with the first strat you'll utilize in the level itself, the crazed crate. i doubt i'll have to explain it but it's extremely luck based, some coins can get such insane speed that chasing them across the whole starting phase of the level is going to be a big big time waster. then we have pokeys. i would say that theyre necessarily not that bad, but dude. sometimes trying to actually ground pound them can be a pain of itself because you wont match their moving patterns so you'll end up ground pounding the ground for no reason because it just decided to move the complete opposite direction to you. then we have the level form itself. the sand is so stupid in this game, you can slide across it losing all the speed, you can start sliding off the hills that you couldn't even tell were there because the colors blend together making a mish-mash of understanding what the hell is a straight normal walkable surface or not. it's just dumb man.

i am either not getting something or i am completely right and i just have to practice the hell out of it just to become a bit better with it, either way, criticism is welcome

Would highly recommend the #gameplay_help channel in the SM64 discord linked above when struggling with a specific star, as well as the RTA guide: https://ukikipedia.net/wiki/RTA_Guide