diff --git a/.github/workflows/CI.yml b/.github/workflows/CI.yml
index ec1643b37..02f1d2035 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/CI.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/CI.yml
@@ -195,12 +195,16 @@ jobs:
   # we might want to pin the SHA once merged
   coverage-comment:
     # Important: make sure to update the SHA after making any changes to the coverage workflow
-    uses: pydata/pydata-sphinx-theme/.github/workflows/coverage.yml@4a1e7898d6c92dade5e489684277ab4ffd0eb053
+    # removing pin to test changes
+    uses: ./.github/workflows/coverage.yml
     needs: [coverage]
     # ensures this runs even if the coverage step does not continue - e.g. the
     # default coverage action will fail at first for external PRs, this is a workaround
     # to ensure the comment is posted
-    if: ${{ always() }}
+    if: ${{ github.event.name == 'pull_request'}}
+    with:
+      # this is the workflow run ID of the `CI.yml` workflow
+      workflow_run_id: ${{ github.event.workflow_run.id }}
     permissions:
       contents: write
       pull-requests: write
diff --git a/.github/workflows/coverage.yml b/.github/workflows/coverage.yml
index 454d926b6..e18df714a 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/coverage.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/coverage.yml
@@ -2,12 +2,15 @@ name: Post coverage comment
 
 on:
   workflow_call:
-
+    inputs:
+      # this is the workflow run ID of the `CI.yml` workflow
+      workflow_run_id:
+        required: true
+        type: string
 jobs:
   test:
     name: "Display code coverage"
     runs-on: ubuntu-latest
-    if: github.event.workflow_run.event == 'pull_request' && github.event.workflow_run.conclusion == 'success'
     permissions:
       pull-requests: write
       contents: write # needed to edit the comment vs opening multiple ones
@@ -21,7 +24,7 @@ jobs:
         env:
           GITHUB_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}
           REPO: ${{ github.repository }}
-          WORKFLOW_RUN_ID: ${{ github.event.workflow_run.id }}
+          WORKFLOW_RUN_ID: ${{ inputs.workflow_run_id }}
 
       # this needs the .coverage file so we download from the CI workflow artifacts
       - name: "Download coverage data 📥"
@@ -30,7 +33,7 @@ jobs:
           pattern: coverage-data-*
           merge-multiple: true
           github-token: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}
-          run-id: ${{ github.event.workflow_run.id }}
+          run-id: ${{ inputs.workflow_run_id }}
 
       - name: "Check downloaded files"
         run: ls -R
@@ -39,4 +42,4 @@ jobs:
         uses: py-cov-action/python-coverage-comment-action@b2eb38dd175bf053189b35f738f9207278b00925
         with:
           GITHUB_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}
-          GITHUB_PR_RUN_ID: ${{ github.event.workflow_run.id }}
+          GITHUB_PR_RUN_ID: ${{ inputs.workflow_run_id }}
diff --git a/.github/workflows/rtd-preview-link.yml b/.github/workflows/rtd-preview-link.yml
deleted file mode 100644
index dd94e540e..000000000
--- a/.github/workflows/rtd-preview-link.yml
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,19 +0,0 @@
-# Workflow to add a comment to a PR with a link to the preview of the docs
-
-name: rtd-preview-link
-
-on:
-  pull_request:
-    types: [opened]
-
-permissions: {}
-
-jobs:
-  add-preview-link:
-    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
-    permissions:
-      pull-requests: write
-    steps:
-      - uses: readthedocs/actions/preview@b8bba1484329bda1a3abe986df7ebc80a8950333
-        with:
-          project-slug: "pydata-sphinx-theme"
diff --git a/docs/conf.py b/docs/conf.py
index e7a82a1c9..503c6beb7 100644
--- a/docs/conf.py
+++ b/docs/conf.py
@@ -358,6 +358,8 @@ def setup(app: Sphinx) -> Dict[str, Any]:
     }
 
 
+# -- linkcheck options ---------------------------------------------------------
+
 linkcheck_anchors_ignore = [
     # match any anchor that starts with a '/' since this is an invalid HTML anchor
     r"\/.*",
@@ -399,3 +401,7 @@ def setup(app: Sphinx) -> Dict[str, Any]:
     r"http://www.yahoo.com": "https://www.yahoo.com/",
     r"https://feature-engine.readthedocs.io/": "https://feature-engine.trainindata.com/en/latest/",
 }
+
+# we have had issues with linkcheck timing and retries on www.gnu.org
+linkcheck_retries = 3
+linkcheck_timeout = 50