While the anime does talk a lot of technical stuffs about racing, like tires, parts and money, it does lack the heat in music and action. It's one of those anime that sets its theme on something popular like music band and sports, but ultimately spends most of its time developing characters. One anime that I begrudge doing this is Beck. There's more talking than music. Like... you gotta have at least 15% of the run time with stuff you advertised, you know? I wanna hear the sounds of engine rumbling constantly every episode. Funny enough, as I am writing this, there is a seasonal anime named High Speed Etoile, that does exactly this.
I guess racing is a boring sports. More boring that football, I dare say. You really need more anime gimmicks to spice it up. Like Meteor Jam! Emperor Time! Kansai Drifto! Revol Bursto! But Overtake! has an try-to-be-real and mature approach, so those cannot fly.
Try to be real, but not real enough. Try to be fun, but limited by real. Overtake! could not overtake itself. It never went full throttle.
