- `kubelet` now emits a metric for end-to-end pod startup latency, including image pull. ([#121041](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/121041), [@ruiwen-zhao](https://github.com/ruiwen-zhao))
- `kubelet` now exposes latency metrics of different stages of the node startup. ([#118568](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/118568), [@qiutongs](https://github.com/qiutongs))

### Documentation

- A new metric `lifecycle_handler_sleep_terminated_total` is added to record how many times LifecycleHandler sleep got unexpectedly terminated. ([#122456](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/122456), [@AxeZhan](htt...

- Fixes a bug where images pinned by the container runtime can be garbage collected by kubelet. ([#120054](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/120054), [@ruiwen-zhao](https://github.com/ruiwen-zhao)) [SIG Node]

- Fixes a bug where images pinned by the container runtime can be garbage collected by kubelet. ([#120053](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/120053), [@ruiwen-zhao](https://github.com/ruiwen-zhao)) [SIG Node]
- Ignore context canceled from validate and mutate webhook ([#120155](https://github.com/kubernetes/kubernetes/pull/120155), [@divyasri537](https://github.com/divyasri537)) [SIG API Machinery]

ManHyuk, Mark Ryan, mbhuiyan, Michal Turek, Mostafa Alaa, Myungsung Kwak, Nand
Dalal, Nehal J Wani, Neil Tenenholtz, ngc92, Nicholas Nadeau, P.Eng., Avs,
Niranjan Hasabnis, P-Hidringer, Paul Van Eck, Peng Yu, Qing Zhao, Qingying Chen,
Quanlong, Rajendra Arora, Rholais Lii, rmanyari, Robin Richtsfeld, Russell
Klopfer, Sagi, Sam Sendelbach, Sandeep N Gupta, Sandip Giri, Sarah Edkins, Scott