One of my favorite flat speed runners is Kunoichi (and she is a Power type too!). Equip Impulse and she can out run most of the early horses without Speed boots.

Kotaro's buttered feet are nifty, but if you want to inflict some damage as you pass the peons, pick Pang Tong or Xiao Qiao. Jump, then air dash and then press triangle. Pang Tong surfs on his cane like a witch and Xiao Qiao swoops like a bird (also her lunging drop kick works great). Ma Chao also has a "psycho crusher" air charge to worm through the air.

And as kakusei mentioned, Zhang He is also a good runner.

quote BrokenKnights

THe only character I've ever run with is Kotaro Fuma in SW2. With his last weapon and Impulse he was almost as fast as Matsukaze. Factor in the inability for him to whistle and the frequency of speed boot drops, and it became complete logical just to run. working back to pick up your horse just wasn't worth it.

But with whistling, even with the fastest of chracters, i think I'd rather just have the horse. Of course, I haven't played as Kunoichi yet.

SXH, I noticed that about Kunoichi earlier today. I have started to level her up, along with Impulse to get her full speed. She's a pretty good character and I started to notice how much of her moves was copied over to Nene, even though I prefer Nene.

"Kotaro's buttered feet"

Kunoishi was one of the most used of my character is SW1. As long as you had her in your party and played Escape from Ueda castle on Hard, you could rush through the level, picking up boxes with another character, and getting their Ultimate Third Weapons without having to kill a single enemy. I rememebr they were better than Fourth Weapons

My FAQs in the SW1 forum was like: "Fourth Weapon - Don't get them".