Unresolved

Why does td gain elsewhere?

I suppose you refer to research. Research is the term for basically spying, reverse engineering the tech of the competitors and applying it to own use. In the game it takes the difference your team lacks behind the best team in an (selected) area and gives you the amount stated by the percentage on the selection screen, rounded up to the next full number. So if you select several areas but across all your competitors some achieved only a gap in acceleration over your team then all you can get is acceleration, or reliability or cooling even if your team among the leading almost everywhere. Also, given the report, it might be advisable to check if focusing on acceleration wouldn't be the better option.