Its a time based game, rushing is still a bad idea. While youre trying to catch up all your upgrades other peoples levels will be rising like crazy.
The forums are AWESOME! I love this community.
Actually not. With right approach and emphasize, you can outlevel others even with rushed base. This is the premise from OP.
Should be mentioned though, this thread was created long before clan war existed, thus any argument which included that particular feature might almost certainly moot.
I rushed to th9 too, best decision evernow I'm using giants lvl6 and aq lvl5 to roll over most th8 I see with at most 2 spells. I bet they are still trying to max pekkas.
Sometimes I make a mistake and don't have enough loot for a builder. At those times I would upgrade my cannons which I previously "neglected" to keep my builder busy for a cheap 800k