User blog comment:Sirebel/Gold, Gold and More Gold/@comment-31409792-20170719163132/@comment-31409792-20170720163534

Never mind. I've looked again and the Upgrade cost is the total upgrade cost necessary for the car to reach 100% whether it is won in the SE or not. So any upgrades completed in order to win the car would count towards the total upgrade cost instead of adding to it. Makes sense now. Thanks for all of your effort in providing this much information to the community. It makes the game so much more enjoyable.