Kevin above mixes two concepts which are different and should not be mixed: physics and "how the actual car handles".
How a car handles is the result of physics, yes, but to a large extent of setups. You can ruin a perfectly good car with a bad setup, and you can compensate (to some extent) design flaws with proper setups. No way around this: setups, being the result of the interaction of team engineers and pilot (with or without analysis of telemetry), are of vital importance in determining how a car handles.
Knowing how a car "handles" is, therefore, best conveyed by someone who actually has or has had the chance to drive it. I'm thinking about drivers such as Ben Collins or Tanner Foust who have had the opportunity of driving dozens of cars, some of them professionally, but any driver with experience should be able to elaborate on how the car "handles".
The Physics of a car (aerodynamics, chassis, tires) is assessed through telemetry and equations (models) with or without the help of specific software (think about CFD models or tire models run with a variety of software and in different platforms).
Knowing how a car handles has a human element to it, the engineering/physics of a car does not.