Initial renewal after Status Match should be something like 25000 miles before the anniversary of your promotion to Gold, not (confusingly!) the end of the anniversary month of joining the program (although the mileage account area on the website isn't sophisticated enough to show that). The initial renewal 'challenge' involved taking 4 flights on TAP as well as the 25000 miles, but subsequent renewals at the normal 50000 mile rate don't have the 'own metal' requirement.

Flying on United in business will get you between 100%, 125% or 150% miles, depending on the exact fare class, and any business fare on Air Canada or Turkish will get you 200% miles. Avoid discount P fares on Lufthansa Group carriers though - they earn precisely 0.00 miles on TAP and many other FF programs (except for SWISS which is something of an outlier and will get you 100%)

A quick correction to the venerable sage CWS' post though - you will earn award miles on non-Star Alliance partners such as Azul and Emirates, but they don't count for status. Per the Ts & Cs here