Yea I find his first form to be not bad at all with just the whip. For me, the only reason I use holy water during that phase is because I need to kill enough fireballs to get the double/triple shot to make sure I can lock down phase 2 form. Once I get triple, I just jump/whip. According to Sir Ilpalazzo you can still lock him down without double shot, but I have personally never been able to do it successfully, and I tried a lot back when I was still using boomerang for phase 1, so it isn't worth trying to do when its so easy to get the double shot anyway.
Honestly, for me the worst thing about Dracula is his spawning. Like when you are running to the left and he spawns like a pixel away from you in the direction you are moving, and you end up in his model when he spawns. Is there a way to predict where he will spawn or do you just need good reflexes/solid luck to not take damage from a bad spawn?