Am I doing this correctly?

What you have descirbed is not correct. The details differ with different products but, if you have the numbers correct it probably means that you need something like this

Servo.writeMicroseconds(700);
delay(100);
Servo.writeMicroseconds(2000);

What you are trying to do is mimic the process of the user pulling the joystick all the way back and then pushing it all the way forward. I suspect that should be followed by another

Servo.writeMicroseconds(700);

so that it does not start at full speed.

The details will be in the ESC user manual.

...R