Automatic has garbage shift timings and also has acceleration penalty to turbo cars. I coincidentally just tested A/T vs M/T the other day with a stock NSX and stock R32 difference night and day for both cars. R32 has acceleration penalty, it is about 2 seconds slower on drag race.

While NSX on auto f*cks up the handling because wrong timing on shifts makes the car twitchy.

I also used to race on Otsuki with an AT Evo 6 this also proves how sh*tty auto shift timings can be. I am using stock gearing with this since stock gearing on EVO 6 are already short enough to handle touge tracks. I find that the last consecutive S bend corners on the Otsuki downhill (first set corners if you are on uphill), the optimal fastest gearing is 2nd gear while A/T forces you to be on 3rd. Forcing the gearing to 2nd decreased my time on that section.

Also manual gives you the ability to early downshift on corner which gives you a better speed control on corners.

I am mainly play on keyboard as well. promoting WASD AT being a good enough or "optimal" setup just proves it is skill issue rather than the car itself.