Was Gary really better than Ash?

[withheld]

At least in season 1, that was the message i felt the series
wanted to give us. But, think of it. Is the case as simple as
'Ash is lazy/goofy, whereas Gary is talented/cool' ?
Since the beginning of the series, Lady Luck smiles to
Gary while turning Her back to Ash...

1. Gary started with Squirtle, a starter pokemon suitable
for beginners, whereas Ash had to deal with a rebellious
Pikachu his very first day as a trainer.

2. Ash has to deal with Team Rocket at every episode.
They are obsessed with him, they don't allow him to
focus on his training, they interrupt his gym battles,
they even caused his disqualification at his first major
competition.

3. Gary had a better moral support with all those
cheerleaders, whereas Ash had to deal with Misty's
demoralizing comments.

3. Gary visited easier gyms. Ok, this is debatable,
considering we don't know exactly what kind of gyms
he visited (the only gyms he and Ash had in common
were the first two, as we see when Gary shows off his
badges), but...
-He logically had an easy task against Brock, having
Squirtle in his team. Gaining his first badge easily
gave him a moral boost. Ash, on the other hand,
had to face him with Pikachu, Butterfree and
Pidgeotto. All 3 of those are weak against Brock's
pokemon. Whichever of those 3 he chose for the
battle, he'd be at a disadvantage. Yet, Brock
commented 'bad strategy' when Ash sent out
Pidgeotto (further demoralization), as if it was
Ashes fault, as if he had the option of using a
pokemon that would not have a type disadvantage.
Alas, he suffered a humiliating defeat, which made
him feel a worthless novice, whereas Gary, at the
same point, logically felt a powerful trainer for easily
beating a gym leader. Even when he was finally
given the badge, winning the way he did (totally
by accident), he probably felt like Brock did a
charity for him.
-I'm pretty sure Gary did not have to face a
psychotic gym leader like Sabrina, whose pokemon
were impossible to beat, not just because they
were psychic type, but because their telepathetic
connection with her rendered them practically
indestructible. Also, Gary never had to fight with
his life at stake, like Ash did against Sabrina.

4. Gary did not lose most of his powerhouses for
stupid reasons. Ash, on the other hand, lost
many of his fully evolved pokemon (Butterfree,
Primeape, Pidgeot; also, Charizard was practically
unusable).

 

[VisionofMilotic]

This is really fun to talk about but I gotta disagree. Gary is much more advanced than Ash in the first season and it has nothing to do with luck, if anything Ash had more lucky breaks than he did. Gary was smarter than Ash and more driven- this was the reason for his success.

If you have some time on your hand see below for why. Wall of text alert!

Spoiler:

1. Gary started with a Squirtle because he evidently put research into his decision. Squirtle is a solid choice for early game in Kanto. Gary did what he was supposed to do. He showed up on time like everyone but Ash and got the Pokemon that he planned on.

The reason Ash did not get any of the original starters on the first day was not just at random, it was because he slept through the event. He stayed up late watching TV the night before and was too tired to wake up on his own. He could have asked his mother to wake him up in case his alarm clock did not go off or he slept through it, but he didn't. This was the most important day of his life, it was Ash's responsiblity to make sure he did not miss it.

There's no indication that Gary got some special treatment. If anything Ash is the one who is getting help because he still got a Pokemon even through he slept through the giveaway. Ash could have been sent home with nothing, and had to wait another year to become a Pokemon trainer. He also through lucky encounters eventually got all of the Kanto starter Pokemon, something very unusual for a trainer.

Pikachu was difficult on the first day, but that was literally for one day and not an excuse for Ash's performance throughout Kanto. Pikachu was the main reason for Ash's success in life. He became a loving and devoted friend to Ash by the end of the episode almost died to saved Ash's life and resulted in Ash seeing a Ho-oh. It was ultimately good fortune that brought Pikachu to him.

2. Yes, Team Rocket are annoying and distracting but one reason Ash has so many dealings with them is because he doesn't learn from his mistakes. He is always falling for some scam, all they have to do is put on a wig and he never grows wise to them.

Fortunately though, Ash always overcomes his confrontations with Team Rocket. There have even been instances where their presence works to his advantage throughout the television series and movies like saving his life or helping Charizard get into the Charicific Valley. Talking specifically about season 1 one enormous way in which Team Rocket benefitted Ash was by being his Viridian City gym opponents, the alternative would be fighting Mewtwo.

Ash almost never attempted to follow a strict schedule of training outside battle. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that, he's ten, he's living in the moment. However, would Ash have really spent him time in carefully-planned regiment even without Team Rocket? You could look at it this way, Team Rocket is getting him some exp for his Pokemon regularly by making him have battles that he would otherwise would not have. Ash ideally grows as a result.

During the Pokemon league yes, they held him up and made him tired, but Ash still got there with help from his friend Ritchie asking that everyone wait for Ash. What ultimately ended Ash was not Team Rocket but using Charizard. He still had other Pokemon like Muk and Kingler that he had not used against Team Rocket and they should have been in good shape. He made the wrong decision and lost because of it.

3. I wholeheartedly disagree with this one. Ash had the best kind of moral support he had best friends Ash and Misty. They are friends who loved him, and advised and taught him all about pokemon, cooked for him, partnered with him in battle, healed his Pokemon, let him borrow their Pokemon, had lots of laughs and adventures together, friends who searched for him when he was lost, friends who would fight and die for him. Yes, sure Ash and Misty had arguements, you can go through this with any friend or family member. However, clearly they all cared about eachother.

Gary did not appear to have any deep relationship with the cheerleaders. While the attention was probably flattering to Gary, these were people probably largely there for the glamor of his lifestyle. I doubt that any of them would go the distance for Gary in the way that Misty or Brock would for Ash. Lady luck brought Ash something much more valuable than Gary had.

4. No, there's nothing to indicate that the gyms Gary went to were easier than Ash, the fact that he went to even more gyms, and had obtained 10 badges by the time he meets Ash again in Viridian indicates if anything that Gary worked hard. He also had to deal with type disadvantage as well, he faught Erika whom his Squirtle would be weak to. We know this because he has the rainbow badge, and Prof. Oak also informed Ash that Gary and all of the other trainers from Pallet conquered Celadon City.

As for Ash having only three pokemon and all of them being weak to Brock, is that a result of bad luck or is it personal shortcomings? One of Ash's biggest flaws as trainer is that he catches very few Pokemon in each region. Before the Pokemon League Gary had more than 200 Pokemon and Ash barely a complete party.

Why is Ash the only trainer not expected to catch pokemon? If the ten year-olds playing the Kanto games at home can catch a Mankey or Nidoran with double kick to fight Brock then so could Ash. That is likely what Gary did since he has a fully-evolved Nidoking.

Ultimately Ash even in the battle with Brock had luck on his side despite having only a couple of Pokemon because he ran into Brock's dad who took Ash to a mill and showed him a method by which he could power up Pikachu. On top of that Ash accidentally had a sprinkler system trigger to weaken Brock's Pokemon. I am almost certain that Gary had neither advantage, it is safe to assume that Gary had to to win the badge in a normal way.

As for Gary never having to face a psychopath gym leader with impossible to beat psychic pokemon... actually he had to do just that lol. Gary had a far more difficult opponent than Sabrina and Kadabra, he had Giovanni and a Mewtwo to deal with, and it lost him the earth badge because the odds were truly insurmountable. Ash however received good luck in both situations that Gary did not have with Sabrina's father helping Ash and Giovanni being called away on business when Ash showed up. On both ocassions Ash got badges that he would not have probably been able to get had he been forced to fight Sabrina and Giovanni under normal circumstances. Most of Ash's badges such as the boulder badge, the cascade badge, the marsh madge, the rainbow badge and earth badge were not obtained in a conventional way to say the least. Gary might have had 20 badges had he received Ash's luck.

5. This is not an excuse Ash is the one who gave his Pokemon away. He may have felt obligated to release Butterfree because it fell in love and wanted to have babies, but that is really the only understandable decision and was probably the least devestating loss to his team. Everything else was up to him. He could have said no, that he didn't want to leave Primeape with strangers or Pidgeot in the woods to babysit random pokemon, and instead said that he wanted to keep them in his party to raise, but he didn't. If they were stupid reasons then Ash is the one who said yes to the stupidity. Nobody made him give any Pokemon away, and nobody made him unable to go get them later. Primeape would have been overjoyed to go punch things at the Pokemon league.

Ash also never spent a day trying to replace his losses and train any of the strong Pokemon like Tauros, Muk or Krabby that were in Oak's lab waiting for him. Any of these Pokemon could have been good teammates.

As for Charizard being disobedient it was because it did not respect Ash initially, and he never made any attempt to train him outside of battle. Had he put more time into working with Charizard than maybe it would have obeyed earlier. Gary has lots of fully evolved Pokemon as a result of his tough training, and all of them listen to him.

As much we love Ash as the hero, Gary as far as I can see in the first season was the more organized and skillful trainer of the two

 

[Darthbane2007]

He already had his 8 required badges by the time ash encountered him on Cinnabar Island...

 

[dot hash]

I feel like Gary was more focused on actually catching and training strong Pok?mon, and actually making logical steps to become stronger and smarter. Even if he has a bad attitude personally.
Ash, however, seems kind of like he has a lot of ideals and beliefs, but doesn't really understand properly how to put them into functional practice. Like he gets too excited and is too hasty, instead of learning about how to catch a Pok?mon and learning how to raise it, he seems to basically just do whatever he feels like and hope it works.

It made me laugh though when you said:
"Gary had a better moral support with all those
cheerleaders, whereas Ash had to deal with Misty's
demoralizing comments."
That's funny to me, it's true if it was me I would think Misty was so annoying always being critical and grumpy lol.

All in all, even though Ash talks a lot about being a Pok?mon Master, I think really he is more interested in just having fun and being friends with Pok?mon, if he was honest with himself. Whereas Gary genuinely seemed to be determined to become as skilled as possible.

 

[Rad Dudesman]

No, he wasn't. Gary barely appeared in the original series, and whenever he did, Ash was always shown to be the better trainer of the two.

 

[weedle_mchairybug]

No, he wasn't. Gary barely appeared in the original series, and whenever he did, Ash was always shown to be the better trainer of the two.

I don't know about that. Maybe in Johto, you could make the argument that Ash might have been the better of the two, especially with the Seaking fishing competition and the Silver Conference where Ash actually beat him straight both times.

However, in Kanto, Gary managed to get about 10 badges prior to Viridian Gym, and presumably also beat Brock as well, not to mention caught more Pok?mon than Ash did, and from the little we could gather, we would assume he beat the Gym Leaders in a straight battle, while with Ash, only half of the gym badges he got were from actually beating the Gym Leaders, the other half dealt with means other than battle, and even in Kanto, where he actually DOES make an effort to catch more than the amount needed for his team, he still doesn't really get much more Pok?mon than most other trainers, and heck, he even released some from his custody (Butterfree, Haunter [since both Ash and Sabrina explicitly said that Ash "caught" it in the Japanese version, it does in fact count as one of Ash's Pok?mon, even if we don't see it inside of a Poke Ball], and Primeape can attest to the whole releasing bit, and that was all prior to the Indigo League.). Heck, during Kanto, it was constantly stressed that Gary was one step ahead of Ash (in fact, the closest it ever got to Ash truly surpassing Gary was when he advanced to the Top 16 while Gary was eliminated fairly early. Well, that and him logging more Pok?mon into the Pokedex than Gary did.).

Just stating it as it is.

 

[Darthbane2007]

Gary already had 5 badges and passed through Celadon City by Primeape Goes Bananas, as well as the other 2 trainers.

 

[LadyJirachu]

Even when I used to crush on Ash...... I think it was hard to deney that Gary did better than him xD;

I mean seriously he trained over 200 species of pokemon before johto even came out o_o;;;;

Gary is a little too good at being a trainer. I don't blame him for just throwing in the towel and becoming a researcher like Oak after awhile lol

(also, personally, i think he had a better thing going with those cheerleaders than Ash had with being picked on by misty. they didn't give him so much back lash. drama for the lose!)

 

[weedle_mchairybug]

Even when I used to crush on Ash...... I think it was hard to deney that Gary did better than him xD;

I mean seriously he trained over 200 species of pokemon before johto even came out o_o;;;;

Gary is a little too good at being a trainer. I don't blame him for just throwing in the towel and becoming a researcher like Oak after awhile lol

(also, personally, i think he had a better thing going with those cheerleaders than Ash had with being picked on by misty. they didn't give him so much back lash. drama for the lose!)

Well, to be fair, it was implied that Gary caught multiple sets of some Pok?mon, since Ash saw more individual species of Pok?mon than him (probably the only time besides Ash advancing to Top 16 in Indigo where Ash actually DID better than Gary during Kanto. I'm not counting Viridian since even with Ash beating Team Rocket and getting the Earth Badge, Gary still got two more badges than him.).

That being said, I must admit, I kinda preferred Misty setting Ash back down, since, after seeing how Gaston acted in Beauty and the Beast, especially when showered with praise, it's probably a very bad idea to have Ash constantly showered in praise in case he gains a big head like Gaston did.

 

[Darthbane2007]

Well, I am surprised Ash managed to make it this far at the Indigo Plateau, considering how often Misty and Brock had to constantly remind him of what to do...

 

[LadyJirachu]

Well, to be fair, it was implied that Gary caught multiple sets of some Pok?mon, since Ash saw more individual species of Pok?mon than him (probably the only time besides Ash advancing to Top 16 in Indigo where Ash actually DID better than Gary during Kanto. I'm not counting Viridian since even with Ash beating Team Rocket and getting the Earth Badge, Gary still got two more badges than him.).

That being said, I must admit, I kinda preferred Misty setting Ash back down, since, after seeing how Gaston acted in Beauty and the Beast, especially when showered with praise, it's probably a very bad idea to have Ash constantly showered in praise in case he gains a big head like Gaston did.

I still hate seeing people get bullied, though. But I do get your point about Ash getting a big head I guess. I guess i'll just go on a 'neutral' to this post....Also I don't like thinking badly of Gary's cheerleaders either xD; Since i'm a girly girl (and always HAVE been one) and want to think good things of other people like me more now. And they always seemed pretty feminine and upbeat to me.

 

[strangerhypno]

Gary was a more disciplined and well rounded trainer during OS Kanto but what's funny is he ranked lower than Ash in the Indigo League.

 

[weedle_mchairybug]

I still hate seeing people get bullied, though. But I do get your point about Ash getting a big head I guess. I guess i'll just go on a 'neutral' to this post....Also I don't like thinking badly of Gary's cheerleaders either xD; Since i'm a girly girl (and always HAVE been one) and want to think good things of other people like me more now. And they always seemed pretty feminine and upbeat to me.

Fine by me (though I don't think I actually commented one way or another on Gary's cheerleaders). I'm more aloof to the triplets, characters who are VERY girly to say the very least, from Disney's Beauty and the Beast myself (I certainly find them more trustworthy than Belle right now, especially after a multitude of factors like a crappy experience in college with so-called "professors" who thought just because they had a degree, they could shove any agenda they wanted even when it had absolutely no relevancy to the actual course they were teaching, plus learning how intellectuals screwed us over since the French Revolution and advocated for our death at the very least. I actually fear Belle will become a Jacobin and backstab Beast again, then pull a Sephiroth on her home village, while I have no concern that they'll become that at all, if anything, I fear they'll end up victims of the French Revolution.), and I guess I won't mind the cheerleaders since they're loyal (and besides, they're cheerleaders, you can't really be a cheerleader if you act like a jerk despite what the stereotype shows since the point of their existence is to raise morale, at least to a certain extent, and you can't do that by acting like a complete jerk to your peers. That's a way to lower morale.). Plus, I'm a pretty big fan of Ariel, who definitely is girly as well as a genuine badass. If anything, I have complete ire towards the Fiorello Fangirls from the episode Princess vs. Princess and the Love Hina girls (in fact, how those girls acted in that episode, and more importantly how Misty NEVER acted like them even when given the opportunity is EXACTLY why I'm very loyal to Misty, loyal enough to try and get her back onto the show.), maybe also Battle Vixens as well.

And personally, I wouldn't call what Misty and Brock did to Ash "bullying." Tough love? Sure, but they at least made every attempt to help Ash out when he needed it (heck, when Ash was having trouble with Brock, Misty literally offered to help by allowing him to borrow her Pok?mon, yet Ash refused the help bluntly, twice. And let's not forget, it's because of Brock's suggestion that Pikachu exploit Lt. Surge's haste in evolving his Raichu to out-pace it literally that Ash even won against Lt. Surge.). In other words, to quote Kim Possible, they're "tough, but fair." You want bullying, actual bullying I should add? Try looking at how the Love Hina girls acted to Keitaru Urashima if he managed, by purely bad luck, to enter the wrong place at the wrong time, and that's if he even walks in on them instead of them walking in on him and beating him up ANYWAY (something that actually DID happen once), or heck, how about them actually forcing Keitaru to see their flesh and then beating him up afterward?

Gary was a more disciplined and well rounded trainer during OS Kanto but what's funny is he ranked lower than Ash in the Indigo League.

Well, at least Gary didn't get his butt handed to him by a giant teddy bear (in case you're wondering what I'm talking about, I'm referring to the infamous ground battle for Endor in Return of the Jedi, where the Emperor's legion of his best troops get manhandled by Ewoks, who were literally giant teddy bear aliens, and with stone age weaponry if I should add). But yeah, and what's worse, Ash and he never even fought each other during that time. Thank goodness Johto allowed for an actual confrontation to settle their rivalry.

 

[Darthbane2007]

It was pure luck Ash made it as far as he did....

 

[CodeHelmet]

Fine by me (though I don't think I actually commented one way or another on Gary's cheerleaders). I'm more aloof to the triplets, characters who are VERY girly to say the very least, from Disney's Beauty and the Beast myself (I certainly find them more trustworthy than Belle right now, especially after a multitude of factors like a crappy experience in college with so-called "professors" who thought just because they had a degree, they could shove any agenda they wanted even when it had absolutely no relevancy to the actual course they were teaching, plus learning how intellectuals screwed us over since the French Revolution and advocated for our death at the very least. I actually fear Belle will become a Jacobin and backstab Beast again, then pull a Sephiroth on her home village, while I have no concern that they'll become that at all, if anything, I fear they'll end up victims of the French Revolution.), and I guess I won't mind the cheerleaders since they're loyal (and besides, they're cheerleaders, you can't really be a cheerleader if you act like a jerk despite what the stereotype shows since the point of their existence is to raise morale, at least to a certain extent, and you can't do that by acting like a complete jerk to your peers. That's a way to lower morale.). Plus, I'm a pretty big fan of Ariel, who definitely is girly as well as a genuine badass. If anything, I have complete ire towards the Fiorello Fangirls from the episode Princess vs. Princess and the Love Hina girls (in fact, how those girls acted in that episode, and more importantly how Misty NEVER acted like them even when given the opportunity is EXACTLY why I'm very loyal to Misty, loyal enough to try and get her back onto the show.), maybe also Battle Vixens as well.

And personally, I wouldn't call what Misty and Brock did to Ash "bullying." Tough love? Sure, but they at least made every attempt to help Ash out when he needed it (heck, when Ash was having trouble with Brock, Misty literally offered to help by allowing him to borrow her Pok?mon, yet Ash refused the help bluntly, twice. And let's not forget, it's because of Brock's suggestion that Pikachu exploit Lt. Surge's haste in evolving his Raichu to out-pace it literally that Ash even won against Lt. Surge.). In other words, to quote Kim Possible, they're "tough, but fair." You want bullying, actual bullying I should add? Try looking at how the Love Hina girls acted to Keitaru Urashima if he managed, by purely bad luck, to enter the wrong place at the wrong time, and that's if he even walks in on them instead of them walking in on him and beating him up ANYWAY (something that actually DID happen once), or heck, how about them actually forcing Keitaru to see their flesh and then beating him up afterward?



Well, at least Gary didn't get his butt handed to him by a giant teddy bear (in case you're wondering what I'm talking about, I'm referring to the infamous ground battle for Endor in Return of the Jedi, where the Emperor's legion of his best troops get manhandled by Ewoks, who were literally giant teddy bear aliens, and with stone age weaponry if I should add). But yeah, and what's worse, Ash and he never even fought each other during that time. Thank goodness Johto allowed for an actual confrontation to settle their rivalry.

Giant Teddy Bear huh? Reminds me of Code Lyoko Episode 1: Teddygozilla. Considering Godzilla is a Japanese creation, it?s ironic that the Giant Teddy Bear goes after Yumi(whose Japanese). Anyways, to get back onto topic, Gary was full of arrogance and an inflated Ego. While Ash was far less competent than Gary, Brock and Misty did him a favor by keeping his Ego in check. When Ash had an inflated Ego after winning Orange Islands, Gary put him in his place.

 

[Kuzehiko]

Uh no, he wasn't.
Gary only defeats Ash in friendly battles but when it came to the regional leagues Ash did alot better than Gary himself. In the Indigo league Ash made it top 16 while Gary ended up top 32. In the Johto league Ash defeated him and he advanced to the quarter-finals while. Ash was a better trainer all along.

 

[weedle_mchairybug]

Uh no, he wasn't.
Gary only defeats Ash in friendly battles but when it came to the regional leagues Ash did alot better than Gary himself. In the Indigo league Ash made it top 16 while Gary ended up top 32. In the Johto league Ash defeated him and he advanced to the quarter-finals while. Ash was a better trainer all along.

To be fair, Indigo was more of a luck of the draw, especially when they never actually fought each other, so the only instance where Ash actually DID prove himself superior to Gary was in the Silver Conference since they, you know, actually FOUGHT each other there. And personally, I'd argue that a guy who got 10 badges, presumably from outright beating the Gym Leaders, would be a bit more skilled than a guy of whom only half of his Gym Badges were gained from actually beating the Gym Leaders (the other half had little to do with his skills in battle).

 

[VisionofMilotic]

Yeah, I agree that a higher placement in the Indigo League doesn't necessarily prove that Ash was a better trainer since they were pitted against entirely different opponents. Gary may have done better had he faced just Ritchie's Pikachu, Charmander and Butterfree. Ash may have done worse if he had faced the trainer with the Golem that ended Gary. This is not to take away from Ash's accomplishments since he did still receive the higher Pokemon league placement, and outperformed Gary. It doesn't show how Ash would have done in a head-to-head matchup against Gary though. I suspect that he would not have been ready at that point because prior to facing Gary at the Silver Conference Ash actually lost to Gary in a one-on-one match against his Eevee after the Orange League.

Gary and Ash tend to go back and forth with eachother taking an eye for eye. Ash had a definitive victory against Gary in Master Quest, nobody's debating that. He beat him fair and square. However, when Ash and Gary battled again after the battle frontier and Gary beat Ash that time. He and Ash both grow and improve.

 

[weedle_mchairybug]

Yeah, I agree that a higher placement in the Indigo League doesn't necessarily prove that Ash was a better trainer since they were pitted against entirely different opponents. Gary may have done better had he faced just Ritchie's Pikachu, Charmander and Butterfree. Ash may have done worse if he had faced the trainer with the Golem that ended Gary. This is not to take away from Ash's accomplishments since he did still receive the higher Pokemon league placement, and outperformed Gary. It doesn't show how Ash would have done in a head-to-head matchup against Gary though. I suspect that he would not have been ready at that point because prior to facing Gary at the Silver Conference Ash actually lost to Gary in a one-on-one match against his Eevee after the Orange League.

Gary and Ash tend to go back and forth with eachother taking an eye for eye. Ash had a definitive victory against Gary in Master Quest, nobody's debating that. He beat him fair and square. However, when Ash and Gary battled again after the battle frontier and Gary beat Ash that time. He and Ash both grow and improve.

Yeah, I'd prefer not having to remember that battle regarding Battle Frontier. I could understand Gary beating Ash after the Orange Islands victory since he was still actually acting as a trainer and thus, you know, actually training his Pok?mon on an active basis, but Gary had retired from being a trainer by that point to basically follow his grandpa's footsteps as a Pok?mon Researcher. There's definitely no way he should have been able to go toe-to-toe against Ash after his victory against a group that was at the very least comparable strength-wise to the regional Elite 4 if not stronger than them based on what Scott said, let alone beat him and his Pikachu (and the latter took out a friggin' Regice with minimum effort). That was just a stupid and pointless battle that only served as an excuse to get Ash to Sinnoh, and the first of several instances that treated the one major accomplishment Ash EVER had in AG (I wouldn't even call his going through Hoenn an accomplishment, let alone a major one, thanks largely to him staying at the exact same rank as in Johto, never actually improving as a trainer until BF) as a complete and total joke (some of the other instances had him and Pikachu taking a nosedive in terms of competency against the Gym Leaders in Sinnoh, not to mention having Pikachu lose against an Ursaring that wasn't even one of Paul's veterans, and that was DESPITE Paul basically having his butt handed to him by Brandon, you know, the owner of that Regice that Ash beat with his Pikachu earlier. If Pikachu should have lost to ANYONE in that fight, it should have been to Torterra, at least THAT Pok?mon's close in experience level to Pikachu.).

 

[Enpatsu Shakugan]

I think anybody is a better trainer than Ash.