This is the real benchmark - compare performance with real, working software instead of microbenchmarks that show a small regression (okay a fairly big one in terms of percentage) on a very specific and unrealistic use case.

I'd take 20 us performance degradation in one specific slice of code over a 50% performance increase overall any day.

edit: english in the previous sentence is bad. You know what I mean. Small regression is fine if the overall speed is much better.