The historical Linda Powers pattern is to take a typical milestone and decompose it into as many pieces as possible. Make each a multi-month process. Dole them out slowly to the long-suffering longs.
Instead of TLD, tease data lock. Not so fast. Maybe just soft data lock, whatever that means. I'm sure it can be further divided further. The 6/2 PR is a masterpiece example:
- review processes at sites - shipping of tissue slides - data collection - identification and resolution of queries - data checking and confirmation - site signoffs - monitoring visits
Building on your airplane analogy, I think the applicable phrase is "foaming the runway" for a bumpy landing.