It's worth it to try to implement in a low and high level language, to see the huge differences in how they can be implemented. We all know "C is fast" but it takes a project like this to go "OH. It's because the high level language is abstracting me into a corner." It was a trip when I first realized how much high level languages can limit you.
Only as long as you avoid any fancy libraries that do a lot of the work for you.
Granted you can use fancy libraries in C too...