No, you actually use the drill to sorta “swim” through the ground, but when you breach the surface you carry your momentum. So a lot of the gameplay is finding how to hop from area to area. What makes it challenging is that once you start digging you can’t stop until you breach the surface, so some areas (kinda like in Celeste) you are quickly navigating from platform to platform in quick succession.
I’d what the videos on the link if you want a better visual.