NASCAR veteran Kevin Harvick has targeted the sport for the deliberate drop in horsepower in next-generation cars after 2015, stating that this isn't a good scenario to play out. He pointed to the wide-open qualifying last weekend in Las Vegas and suggested that cars need more power. Harvick and several other drivers have brought up similar concerns in the past, but NASCAR stated that increasing power considering the associated costs does not necessarily fix the problem. NASCAR Chief Racing Development Officer John Probst explained in March last year that it would be an expensive deal to try something out without a guaranteed outcome. He said: "If you add the horsepower, you add the cost, then you see if it is better. There's no guarantee you get there, and it would be any better. And I think there's some evidence that shows as we add horsepower, they run further apart. "There's some that shows it's better ... and there's some other shows no, might not be. So that's a heck of a gamble to take with the entire industry." However, Harvick, with his extensive NASCAR experience, believes the sport is in desperate need of more horsepower for its cars, citing the wide-open qualifying in Vegas. He said on Kevin Harvick's Happy Hour podcast: "It's absolutely ridiculous that we went to an unrestricted mile-and-a-half, and they qualified wide-open. What in the world do we need to do to get more horsepower? This screams horsepower to me. This is not a good scenario. I've heard all the things about different manufacturers and different this and different that, but I haven't seen it. Put some damn power in the cars. Wide-open qualifying at an unrestricted mile-and-a-half racetrack is dumb." He added: "If your shoes gave you blisters on your foot, and they felt uncomfortable all the time, would you keep putting those shoes on? I don't know why we keep putting the same shoes on. Why can't we just fix the damn problem? We've spent millions of dollars on aerodynamics and now we're qualifying wide-open. They made the left side tire that much softer, and they're just hammer down." According to Fox Sports' Bob Pockrass, several NASCAR drivers have been wanting more than 670 horsepower, which the engines currently churn out for most races, with the exception of high-speed tracks with steep banking where the speed is limited to prevent the cars from lifting off. Joey Logano is one of those drivers who called for more power last year. He said: "We want more power. It increases tire wear. It makes the track wider. And it's more badass." However, it remains to be seen if NASCAR will ever consider increasing the horsepower of the current cars, even if it means doing it temporarily to test potential outcomes.