Ok, normally backwards should be slower. My Big Rock has backward maybe 50%.
If you're Motor is spinning in the wrong Direction, you have to change two of the three cables between ESC and Motor.
The setting of my transmitter and also girlfriends TX is also on reverse. This setting has nothing to do with driving forward or backward, it´s just the direction which the pulse signal works.
If you pull the trigger, do you can indicate forward on the led of the ESC? If yes and the motor is also spinning forward, I guess something happens with the programmed endpoints on the transmitter.