Answers!
Various arm-pumping questions - Arm pumping doesn't increase Samus's velocity, rather, each pump bumps her position forward a tiny bit. Speed when jumping or mockballing is based on Samus's velocity at the time of the jump. So if I need to make a long jump and don't have a lot of platform to run on, I can obtain a faster jumping speed by not arm-pumping (essentially making the distance traveled longer, giving me more time to gain speed).
33900 - Confirmed, unfortunately. It's tough to make that part look smooth.
35000 - If it's possible, the distance traveled in ball form is so tiny that I doubt it would even save a frame. I didn't specifically try it here, but I tried it in Crateria after the bomb boss, and a mockball ended up being slower with preparation time.
37800 - No, I need enough speed to make the jump in the next room, so I can't move to the right very far until I'm on the ground. I just shot the door when I had the chance so I wouldn't have to worry about it later.
40000 - I've never seen this trick, myself, but if it worked, it would probably allow for a couple more arm pumps.
41500 - Nope. Doors heading up or down place Samus higher or lower than it would seem, depending on the direction.
44700 - Facing left puts my "location" more to the right, so I can acquire the Varia suit a few frames earlier than just jumping at it, and since my momentum is reset, it doesn't matter where I am when I collect it.
46200 - I tried this the same way Michael did, but the enemies were diving at me too quickly. I also tried boosting off the one to the right I didn't kill, but this way was 4 frames faster.
51500 - Ok, I think I finally understood what you are asking. I jump a bit more here because I have to wait for the door to open anyway, and bringing the door up cuts down on the time between rooms, since the game sloooooowly scrolls up before scrolling to the right. Normally I don't care enough to optimize this type of thing because it can make for sloppier play during rooms to save frames between rooms. But I made an exception here since I was waiting for the door to open anyway.
53158 - No, the opening for this missle is very narrow, and also you have to jump slightly after shooting, or you will run into the block that hasn't quite desintegrated yet.
55200 - This is actually probably faster than the five missles at the Wave Beam door. Crap. I used five missles at the wave beam door because that extra Super Missle is better used on Crocomire. I don't max out on Super Missles until a couple rooms before him (bubble room) and I don't know of any places to spawn a super missle in those few rooms between there and Crocomire. But five missles on this door is probably faster. I spent about 20-25 frames using them on the Wave Beam door, probably more like 5-10 on this door, max.
62200 - It is possible to shinespark over Crocomire right after he starts to die, but if he is on the screen at this time, it causes lots of lag. I don't think I could be any lower, though. Either way, it doesn't cost time, because I have to wait for Crocomire to make his way to the left.
62500 - No, Samus is slow in lava, and also I need all the energy I can get for the next few shinespark and lava rooms.
63400 - If you run to the left immediately, then you have to sit there for a while and wait for Crocomire's bubbles underwater to move far enough to the left. I did the running to demonstrate speeding up Samus's leg speed without actual speed.
51500 - You go a bit higher than the platform here? But it was a large jump up, so I don't know if it's possible to jump exactly to the platform here?
65300 - Hitting with shoulder while turning around...is this the thing MF did a bunch? Turning around while spin-jumping is faster in general, similar to Varia suit.
67800 - This would probably work if I had the High-Jump boots, but I can hardly get anywhere to the right while jumping (which I must do if diagonal will go to the right far enough), all the while trying to have decent jumping speed, and keeping shinespark charged.
71800 - I don't know exactly how long a charge lasts, but definitely not long enough for this. It's possible to slow-charge on this platform and skip the grapple beam usage, but that's around a second slower.
72500 - Running through the acid from stationary speed isn't fast at all, and like I said, it doesn't matter, I need to get to Crocomire's skeleton at that specific frame.
73600 - Same meaning, the turn-around-shoulder thing? This is faster. I'm not sure what MF was going for in this room, but I beat him by 18 frames here.
<Swordless> Go hug a tree, you vegetarian (I bet you really are one)
