I need to jumpstart my fitness routine

This is the strength training area at my gym

I’ve lost a lot of weight (about 40 pounds) since I started working out again in February 2010. I’ve been at it now for over 5 months. I can run up to 6 miles on a good day under the right conditions and my latest bench press was 205 pounds for 9 reps. That’s all pretty amazing.

I’m not where I want to be, however. I want to get down to 185 pounds. I still have about 25 pounds to lose (sometimes the scale says 30 pounds!) in order to get there. I want to be able to run a 1/2 marathon. I still have 7 miles to go (I’m not even at the half way point in mileage). I want to be able to bench press over 300 pounds. My hunch is that I can probably do 260 pounds for a single rep. I have other fitness goals that I have yet to reach as well.

I need something to kick-start my engine though. I’m starting to feel complacent. No, not so complacent that I’m going to backslide into morbid obesity. But yes, complacent to the point that I may just make where I am now a permanent fitness plateau.

I’m going to start lifting weights more frequently and adding treadmill runs at the end of the weight training sessions. I’ve been focusing on lifting 3 times per week with a routine that hits all my muscles groups. Now I’m thinking about doing more exercises for each body part. That means, however, I can’t finish an all-body workout in 1 hour (it’ll probably take more like 2.5 hours).

Yesterday’s strength training focused on legs and chest. I also ran 2 miles at 5.1 mph on a 1.0% grade/incline. The entire workout lasted 1hour 26 minutes.

I started the workout intending to do my usual full-body workout. However, by the time I finished the leg press, squats, leg curls and calf-raises it was already 30 + minutes into the workout (I wanted to do squats but the rack was being used so I started on the leg press and then moved over to the squats afterwards). That’s when I decided I’d better pick another muscle group and wrap it up with a run.
Today I’m going to do back, shoulders and arms. If my body holds up I’m going to try doing a run outside later this evening after the kids go to bed (in lieu of a treadmill run).

The problem I foresee is not being able to do this workout back to back to back because it’s going to really fatigue my triceps. The alternative is to do back, biceps and legs on one day and shoulders, chest and triceps on the other day. This might workout better.

I’m going to see if this increased focus on strength-training may help me get my workouts re-energized!