Not really. Everyone takes this race:
...

I guess you could fiddle around with NRSE and NAS, and changing PRT's at least theoretically an option even if the HE will basically always win, but all other options have a clear "optimum" if you don't consider the points.

StarsRace.pl will pull that data out for you. I did just give a try to reading a race in, and then pushing it back out without changing it. That I can do. But I'm corrupting the file somewhere when I change other bytes in it. I recall I can't change the password in a .r file either even though I can reset it in .m, .hst, and .x files. I think it's tied to the same thing that causes race file corruption. Sorry. After I change a .r file in any way stars reports it as corrupt.

The issue is, as raptor said, the checksum. To check for race file corruption or hacking the game makes a number which depends on all the settings, and if recalculating it from the actual settings doesn't match it rejects it as corrupt.