I can say that in my experience ABS is a very good thing on a motorcycle.
I bought my Tenere (also a blue one) in April last year and drove with it little over 5000 km.
ABS saved my ass for falling more then 3 times. As I like to drive quite fast on gravel then sometimes I needed to press very hard both brakes to stop and ABS will forgive you such action. Without ABS I would have probably fallen.
This is true that using only rear brake on gravel your braking distance will be longer but you can always install a switch to disable ABS. I�m planning to do this. It can be good option driving at sand quarry.
And finally I will put here a picture from my bike: do not know how to insert image directly to this post.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/vwpa1hwganqfzo4/956.jpg?dl=0