The 1972 Talladega 500 was a NASCAR Winston Cup Series race that took place on August 6, 1972, at Talladega Superspeedway in the American community of Talladega, Alabama. The race car drivers still had to commute to the races using the same stock cars that competed in a typical weekend's race through a policy of homologation (and under their own power). This policy was in effect until roughly 1975. By 1980, NASCAR had completely stopped tracking the year model of all the vehicles and most teams did not take stock cars to the track under their own power anymore.