My 86 I had to turn its understeer way up to make it controllable...there are deadzones you can use to make the cars ALOT more manageable, lettme post them.
There are 2 things you need to do, the 2nd will sound odd though...
Steering Dead Zone-15%
Accel Dead Zone-10%
Brake Dead Zone-10%
Steering sensitivity-5%
Acell Sensitivity -5%
Brake sensitivity-5%
Speed steering Sensitivity 100%
At the main menu enter CAR GARAGE----> TUNING, press 'Y' to enter quick tuning mode.
Under the heading 'balance' move the slider all the way to OVERSTEER. That's right oversteer. Apparently the developer labeled this slider wrong or its a glitch. Turning the slider to oversteer will actually add understeer.
That being said drifting is possible.
As you can see here is the car being run in drift mode.
and standard race mode.
EDIT these are diff from the settings I was using but I've heard good things and im testing them out right now in drift and circuit
EDIT 2 Having tested these, WOW its like a whole different game...I can tollerate playing it now...everyone try this and spread the word to all those hating the game, what a massive difference it makes.