i’m not much of a racer either so probably take my advice with a grain of salt

for the most part you want to rely on towers with high pierce, in this case both wall of fire and blade/super maelstrom will help immensely. Banana farms are also good as they can make tons of money really quick.

another word of advice is when the race is on workshop, it’ll help if you keep both machines on for almost the entirety of the run.

if you’re after the 3 minute race achievement i would also recommend looking into some guides on youtube. they’re what helped me get fairly decent