So, with the template side of things with pages, I see you are going through that with the designer there to get that sorted, so hopefully you can get that to where it needs to be. This will of cours also affect the sidebar on those pages, so would suggest you get that sorted first of all.
With the speed of things, before you do anything else, go to support in the top right of your admin CP, adn address the database items. These will certainly cause slowdown (the INNODB one specifically), and are server side items. You would need to contact your hosting company to correct the table types if you are unsure on how to do this