I always race with traction control off but it is never all the way off. The car will upshift with traction control "off" instead of cutting the power like it does with it on unless you get really, really out of shape. I found out what was going on because of my data logger. Then I did some tests to verify. If you can, watch for the traction control light. With traction control turned off it will flash 2 or 3 times and then upshift if the tires are loosing traction. Perhaps it's stability control and not traction control but the result is an early upshift and a slow time.

Les