No.
Yes. Since he also did on his way to namek.
Oh so near-death power-ups matter? No.
I remember a trip to namek where he spent the entire time training that made the difference. And Vegeta got just as much trough near-death power ups. Actually,I think he had more near death power ups than Goku...
It's implied that Vegeta had surpassed Goku at that moment. There wouldn't be any reason to imply such thing if it wasn't true.
It's implied , not stated , so it isn't a fact. And my point was that since it expressed uncertainty it means that even if he did surpass Goku, the difference was so small they couldn't be sure. If the author wanted the readers to know for sure Vegeta had surpassed Goku at that point, he would have made things clearer. So the only time Vegeta surpassed Goku , it was with a small difference. When Goku surpassed Vegeta, he does so by a good deal more.
I'll just repeat myself: on Earth's conditions Goku is kind of screwed. I can only see him having efficient training with Oob, since Oob is a really good sparing partner.
No, he isn't. 10 years later, with "earth conditions", Goku is still stronger than Vegeta and I bet probably by a good deal still.
Vegeta ended up 2nd to Goku, so Goku's better. How does that prove that Goku's training is more efficient (if they were to train under same conditions, ofc)?
I don't understand the logic here. Goku is stronger and better BECAUSE his training is more efficient. They already trained once under the same conditions and Goku surpassed him by so much Vegeta couldn't catch with one more additional year. That is the difference between how much more efficient Goku's training was.
And you keep bringing up eath conditions. Vegeta didn't have eart conditions either. He had a custom made training room that allowed him to change his training conditions however he wanted. We have no proof whatsoever that Goku had special or harder conditions. The only thing he had was lack of fatique in the afterlife.
Vegeta, although he knows he has trained harder than Goku, says Goku is a genious when it comes to fighting. So that means Vegeta himself dismisses the notion that it was because of the afterlife that Goku got so much better. And this was before he found out about SSJ3.