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You may waver slightly from the actual beat during fast sections, either single note or strumming (it’s only natural when playing fast) but providing you start and finish on the beat, it’s fine and adds a human element to the passage. If you’ve ever heard famous drummers quantised, you’ll notice it feels unnatural, even though it’s bang on time. In short, feel it. At least this is what I do.

I'm not sure that I understand the question. I'm a drummer; I don't count 'notes', I count the tempo. If I need to play something fast, when I'm learning it, I play it slowly. Once I've mastered it slowly, I'll increase the tempo, little by little (over a couple of weeks, for instance...) until I can play it at, or slightly faster, than the target tempo. By that time, there's no 'counting' involved, as it's ingrained. The secret to playing anything fast is to play it slowly. Does this help..?