Ah, yeah, so many people can pop in and out of Mario Kart that I can't remember them all. I used to host theme races where the idea was to use a character or one of a few characters that matches the theme. In that case, the theme was "Mario Mania" so everyone chose Mario and we played all the tracks with Mario in the name. I guess you didn't get a response since no one knew you, but that's disappointing. That's the downside to not being able to use voice chat, but it is what it is.
I much prefer to play co-op games anyway, though it sounds like you wouldn't want to play those...!