Paid attention as to not lose Focus on back road (12)
I believe the answer is:
concentrated
'paid attention as to not lose' is the definition.
I can't tell whether this defines the answer.
'focus on back road' is the wordplay.
'focus' becomes 'concentrate' ('concentrate' can be a synonym of 'focus').
'on back road' becomes 'd' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'concentrate'+'d'='CONCENTRATED'
Can you help me to learn more?
(Another definition for concentrated that I've seen is " Focused - made denser".)