this is the way.

but putting delay between events (not keystrokes) is nevertheless a good practice

Thanks. I had forgot about that because the Windows key by itself was fast enough in Windows 7 that I stopped using Win+R.

There is, but even that's not perfect. I have this stupid habit where I bring up the NVDA screen reader when I want it by typing Windows+R, typing "nvda", and pressing Enter. (I have low vision, and I use a screen reader sometimes, but not all the time.) I know, I really should use a desktop keyboard shortcut instead. Anyway, it's muscle memory, and I do it automatically, without watching for the Run dialog to appear. Only sometimes, the Run dialog doesn't appear fast enough, and maybe the "n" doesn't make it into that dialog's edit box. Or, on one or two embarrasing occasions, the Run dialog didn't grab focus at all, or at least not until way too late, and a message that just said "nvda" made it into a chat window.

MacOS manages to provide an advanced search launcher experience as fast or faster than the run dialog that requires the perfect exe name.

What’s Microsoft’s excuse? Tired of their incompetence being handwaved and a several decades old jank non-solution being held up as acceptable. MS needs more accountability in their teams.