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Your reading ability for any subject is a balancing act between the speed at which you read and your comprehension (the speed at which you think). When either is greater than the other, your effective reading ability suffers.
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Your reading ability balances on top of your reading speed and your thinking speed, normally called your comprehension.
When your reading speed and your thinking speed are evenly matched, you can balance your reading ability at its maximum.
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Problems start when you increase one or other out of sync. Your reading ability suffers.
Below you can see the results of increasing or decreasing one or other:
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Thinking too fast
This is the normal state of affairs for most people. Almost everyone currently thinks faster than they read, or put the other way around, you read more slowly than you think.
You probably find your mind often wanders when reading, as it uses this spare thinking capacity. These wanderings become the random thoughts that interrupt your concentration as you are reading.
Resolving this involves developing an open, relaxed and focused state of mind, the optimum for learning.
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Reading too fast
This is an issue you only encounter when learning something new. While you can read quite quickly, your comprehension is slower and many of the words you read will be lost through this gap.
This is also what happens if you learn to speed read but leave your comprehension at lower levels.
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The desired result
If you increase both your reading speed and comprehension together...
You will increase your reading ability.
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Reading Science