[MKWii TAS] GCN Waluigi Stadium (No Glitch) -

Ever since I started making kart TASes in 2019, GCN Waluigi Stadium has always been a track that I've had the most interest in TASing, since it seemed apparent that the category had the most room for improvement over the real-time world record. My first attempt at this track from 2019 was a 35.222 lap 1, which obviously left a lot of room for improvement, but proved this was another track where kart could theoretically beat the real time bike WR. Throughout 2020 and 2021, I continued to sporadically return to this track, finding new strats and small optimizations to shave off even more time, but I found it to be really difficult to finish a run, since every turn is heavily influenced by QM. I finished the first two laps of this run in 2022, but didn't really touch this game much throughout the first half of 2023. Thankfully, I regained my motivation more recently, and managed to complete the full run.

Similarly to Coconut Mall, this is one of the few tracks where Funky Kong remains the fastest character for kart, since there's practically zero snaking aside from the lap transitions, and every single orange miniturbo is interrupted by a boost ramp, rendering Dry Bowser's miniturbo stat advantage almost completely useless.

After landing the final ramp on lap 3, I make use of a strange mechanic which could be considered a kart equivalent to superhopping. As you might know, karts can't do conventional superhopping, for the simple reason that they can't spindrift, which is why these inputs are slightly different. Upon landing, I reach max speed by hopping down the sloped ground, which creates an effect similar to supergrinding, only that the tires aren't stuck in the ground. The speed decreases once I reach the flat section of the road, but I can maintain a slightly higher speed than normal by continuing to sideways hop, which also has the benefit of giving me a better angle towards the finish line. In total, this saves around .04 from the trick landing to the finish line. I'm not sure how much use this mechanic could have in other kart TASes, but it's definitely worth researching further, even though snaking would likely be faster in most cases.

Music: Thousand Leaves - The Gathering