Yeah, it's nitpicking, it's hard, it's unapologetic, ruthless, doesn't care about your feelings and shatters your hopes and dreams.
I've never been as pissed off at a game like this since f-zero GX or super monkey ball, and that's why I love it. You know what sucks about games that have a low learning-curve? They're boring because there's no challenge. You'll play it once or twice and just leave it there in the corner. Hard games make you play until you drop dead of failure and you can enjoy beating it. Driving just isn't easy if you want to follow each small little rule to minimize the chance of getting into an accident. Driving has a lot of luck and skill involved in it, it's reacting to other people, but also being proactive to achieving your destination as quickly as possible.
The upside is that if you're playing this in VR with a g27 or g29 with a shifter, it's the closest thing to real-life driving. F-zero GX and super monkey ball never gave you skills that you can use for something useful, this does. So suck it up and enjoy failing over and over again, because the rush you get for finishing an assignment in career mode in this game, is just better than getting an achievement in CoD.