Guillaume is on the money about Crash games being absolute garbage.
I know some people enjoy the series, and personal enjoyment is very subjective so they aren't "wrong"... but the games play like mediocre iPhone games pushed out by amateur devs on a budget crunch. Granted, when the Crash games were released, 3D game design was new and consoles weren't nearly as powerful. Still, that's not enough justification to waste time on them when there were better games available.
That said, I'll give CTR (Crash Team Racing) a bit of slack. It's not great, and people who proclaim it the best racer ever must be looking through some nostalgia-tinted glasses.. but it's a perfectly acceptable Kart game for the time and better than many Mario Kart knock-offs.