diff --git a/test/functional/suite_test.go b/test/functional/suite_test.go
index 4c9ece07..e243a665 100644
--- a/test/functional/suite_test.go
+++ b/test/functional/suite_test.go
@@ -114,6 +114,10 @@ var _ = BeforeSuite(func() {
 
 	By("bootstrapping test environment")
 	testEnv = &envtest.Environment{
+		// Increase this to 60 or 120 seconds for the single-core run
+		ControlPlaneStartTimeout: 120 * time.Second,
+		// Give it plenty of time to wind down (e.g., 60-120 seconds)
+		ControlPlaneStopTimeout: 120 * time.Second,
 		CRDDirectoryPaths: []string{
 			filepath.Join("..", "..", "config", "crd", "bases"),
 			// NOTE(gibi): we need to list all the external CRDs our operator depends on
@@ -129,6 +133,14 @@ var _ = BeforeSuite(func() {
 			// failing on the colons in ::1
 			LocalServingHost: "127.0.0.1",
 		},
+		ControlPlane: envtest.ControlPlane{
+			APIServer: &envtest.APIServer{
+				Args: []string{
+					"--service-cluster-ip-range=10.0.0.0/12", // 65k+ IPs
+					"--disable-admission-plugins=ResourceQuota,ServiceAccount,NamespaceLifecycle",
+				},
+			},
+		},
 	}
 
 	// cfg is defined in this file globally.