I did say a well sorted Paralever, so unless you have ,the ability to prepare one and the skill to ride it quickly one you shouldn't really be so dismissive.
And, FWIW, on a decent biking road with a 110 km/hr limit I have no trouble outrunning a 1200 oilhead on my warmed up F650 Funduro, never mind my GS.
Yes, the Oilhead has more peak horsepower , but a single horsepower figure tells you next to nothing about how any machine performs in the real world , on roads with speed limits and, shock horror, maybe ever a bend or two!
But the comparison isn't that simple - bikes today have more power than anyone can use on public roads, and much more than most riders can handle anywhere, even on a closed track.
There are probably few who could ride a well sorted GS flat out on public roads, so putting most on a more powerful bike would bike would make little difference to their progress.
I few years back I had a bit of a windfall and the means to buy almost any ADV bike of my choosing.
I tried just about every bike available in Oz, and quickly came to realize that almost every magazine tester has never seen the bike he is supposed to be testing, never mind ridden it - there are a fair few shockers out there, and BMW make their fair share of them!
I ended up paying 400 quid for a rough but mechanistically sound 95 Funduro, which gave me plenty of room for an Ohlins and Team Pami bits too get it flying, but even stock it was better than some of the new bikes I test rode.
In just the same way that my well sorted GS is !
Just because some half witted road tester who prattles on about cruise controls and how he turns the ABS off because he is too skillful to need it gives a new bike a glowing write up doesn't mean they are any good.
At one BMW launch the complete fleet broke down irreparably before the scribes had even ridden theM, and at another the bikes were so foul handling that one of the testers was killed on the first day and the event was aborted, but in both cases the scribes penned their launch reports as if the launch has gone perfectly and gave the bikes glowing reports.
I don't see the world through rose tinted glasses - mine are clear and I see the real world, not the fairy land that magazine testers and those silly enough to believe everything they read live in.
Are you Boxerlust's grandfather ?