I recommend a game that not many people look at, but that I love, because it's what racing games should be like.
Juiced 2. If more people had the game, and played online, it'd be a lot more hectic, since you can bet on people online, and depending on the odds, you can make a ton, or lose a ton. People can also bet on you, so you determine whether people make money off of you or not =)
And with the new system of wingmen that was integrated, racing with CPU's has never been so exciting (you can tell your wingmen to focus on crashing others, staying ahead, etc.)