Yours is probably faster. The knuckles route bypasses a huge chunk of the level.

That said, apparently the "Transform as you enter the boss arena" trick can be used in Ice cap as well. Wouldn't be surprised if it's viable in other levels as well.

Here's a link to the timestamp. Sorry about me and my friends yelling all over it. No idea how easy it is to re-create, but maybe it could save you a few seconds in an all-emeralds run or something.

First post ever on this site. Sorry if I'm doing anything wrong.

I was streaming This last night with some friends, and I managed to accidentally Skip the Carnival Night Act 2 Boss by transforming into Super Sonic right before the fight started. The screen scrolled too far making the egg capsule visible. Hitting it caused the score tally to start, and skipped the post-boss scene with the cannon.

I did some googling but couldn't find any other mention of this glitch, so I figured I'd post it here. I'll post a clip as soon as the video finishes processing.