Writing gets more time consuming as you get better at it

Just finished the first pass through my novel. All through it I didn't really feel like I was doing much, but when it was done, I looked back and saw that I'd cut 11,000 words, so that's not nothing. But on a broader level, I changed nothing.

However as I was going through I was struck both by pacing issues and by issues with the primary antagonist. I be…