Seconded, this is my concern and my fear as well. Combined with Higher standards for EIPs, I think we have the beginnings of what needs to be done to improve the EIP process and increase the pace of innovation.
I think testing is definitely one bottleneck in the existing process and we should discuss how to improve throughput - I think a “layered pipeline” approach as discussed here would make sense. Does the testing team have sufficient resources today? CC @holiman (I don’t see Dimitry here)
Another thought to consider: instead of a waterfall approach, would a leaner approach with multiple “sprints” maybe make sense here? It seems like Afri’s proposal, which we’ve been working with for Istanbul, works this way - we’re pursuing multiple EIPs at the same time, with hard deadlines for EIP submission, implementations, testing, etc. and whatever makes it into the next upgrade goes in, whatever doesn’t must wait until the following one.