As I started to level up to 30+ I was starting to be be able to stay in gyms. I hunted down and maxed out the gym meta pokemon that wasn’t ultra rare like Eevee, Rhydon and Magikarp. It felt great that with each level up, I felt like I was growing as I was able to power up my pokemon more and be ranked higher in gyms. I mainly played around my local neighbourhood and looked after the gyms there. Let’s just say they were mostly red. :)

The 3172cp Dragonite is 100IV. I caught it as a Dratini in January 2017. It’s my most prized baby and I was super lucky to get the best legacy move set when it evolved. It is 1 of 3 pokemon that I have completely maxed out (the other 2 being Blisseys :p)   

Having the goal of getting enough candy to evolve and power up this little Dratini was awesome. I would sprint like mad for a random Dratini nearby for the candy. I don’t really run for much these days. Hopefully gen 3 changes that :)

I was not so lucky on move sets for the 4 gen 1 ‘trade to evolve’ pokemon. I do have an Alakazam with the best move set that I use for Machamp raids now. However what I really wanted the most at the time was a Golem with double rock moves to fight Dragonites since Lapras was the last pokemon to complete my non-regional gen 1 pokedex and I only finally hatched one after gen 2 came out. After many evovles I finally got a Golem with rock throw/stone edge. It only had 80 IVs but I powered it anyway because I really needed it. I even powered up a Jnyx and Cloyster because I didn’t have anything else.

I also wanted a Gengar with double ghost moves and a Machamp with double fighting moves because I really liked those pokemon. Sadly it never happened until it was too late and I’m annoyed that the move ‘shadow claw’ is now legacy because it’s stronger and looks so much cooler too. For Machamp I finally got double fighting moves…. shortly before TMs were announced :p

Back to gym battles, I would spend almost an hour taking down level 10 gyms on the weekend. I’m kind of glad those days are over especially when people trained them back to level 10 using the cheap multi account strategy. I am also glad that own team member gym sniping is no longer a thing as it was one of the most frustrating things in the old system.

One of my most satisfying moments was taking down 10 pokemon with 6. I don’t think they were easy ones either. On the right is a Lapras I got during the water event in March 2017. I ran like crazy for this one and it was well worth it as it’s still my number 1 Dragonite destroyer.

Even though I did a lot of gym battling, I’m only 944/1000 on my Ace Trainer badge because I’m usually the one to take down gyms, not train them up.

Part 3 >