You dont have to abandon that keyword. You can build links for multiple keywords and phrases. This has the advantage of starting to dirve some traffic for the less competetive keywords quite quickly but still keeping you in the hunt for the more sought after ones. It also looks more natural to search engines.

It is likely to be a long haul for some really competetive words but they are where you want to be. Have you checked to see if you can get Squidoo page for you keyword phrase?

And remember its a game of 2 halves