 Solution

Let $g_t=P_{1-t}(\nabla f)(X_t)$. The triangle inequality for the conditional average givesThe independent coordinate Brownian motions have zero cross-variation, so the quadratic variation of a stochastic integral givesThe Dambis-Dubins-Schwarz theorem says that a continuous local martingale $N$ starting at zero whose quadratic variation diverges admits a Brownian motion $B$, with the inverse-clock filtration, such that $N_t=B_{[N{]}_t}$. If the total clock is finite, one may enlarge the probability space and append independent Brownian motion after the clock terminates. This gives the same identity up to the original lifetime.

Apply this theorem to $N=M-M_0$. The clock bound implies the event inclusionThe latter event is contained in the union of the upper and lower crossing events. Symmetry of Brownian motion givesThis uses only an event inclusion; independence between the Brownian motion and its random clock is neither assumed nor needed.