A friend at college told me that being hit with the cane hurt; but that when a teacher took two or three steps before caning you, that hurt even more. I don’t think he had been caned himself, so he was probably passing on a rumour he had heard at his school.
A different friend told me that at his school, there was a rule that teachers could not raise the cane in the air before whacking you, but could only whack you from waist height. One teacher got round this by making the boy bend over, opening the classroom door, and running the whole length of the corridor!
On the other hand, the cartoon in Beano and Dandy (RIP) although they were very imaginative about the details of whackings, never really showed Teacher or Dad running up before hitting boys.