Awww <3 such a heartwarming story. Very cute game.
Minor thing: when I agreed to the race, there was a small delay before it started, so I thought maybe some input did not go through, and I pressed E again. Then the delay was gone, the race started, but due to my second E proc I was simultaneously in conversation with Linus who was asking if I wanted to go for a race - while there was another Linus already running laps :D Very minor, unimportant stuff, but if you are planning to roll out a new patch after the jam, maybe you could find a way to block that conversation when the race is ongoing.