Most of the time "make something faster than anyone else has done" is just not worth doing? Good enough is good enough. Unless it's some super hot path and it's the speed that's the main goal, nothing else. Which is rarely the case.
If you only ever think of tinkering for the purpose of execution speed ninjutsu, isn't it your definition of tinkering that's far too narrow?
No, I’m saying that it’s how I like to tinker. Others have their own ways of tinkering that are just as valid!
I personally think the optimization challenge is fun. I like digging in to low level stuff, reviewing the assembly dumps and processor pipeline architectures. I fail or give up most of the time, but I enjoy learning in the process.
I’m just trying to show how Zig fits my tinkering well, since you said you can’t see how Zig would ever be a good fit for tinkering. I’m not saying it’s a good fit for all forms of tinkering.