Richard Petty, the 1972 NASCAR Winston Cup Series Champion. This would be his 4th of his 7 championships.
The1972 NASCAR Winston Cup Series was the 24th season ofprofessionalstock car racing in the United States and the 1st modern-era NASCAR Cup series season. The season began on Sunday January 23 and ended on Sunday November 12.Richard Petty won his second consecutive Winston Cup Championship and fourth overall.Larry Smith was namedNASCAR Rookie of the Year.
This season is considered to be the first of NASCAR's "modern era". The number of races was reduced from 48 to 31, all dirt tracks were removed from the schedule, and a minimum race distance of 250 miles (402 km) was established for oval tracks. (The shortest scheduled race in the modern era was the2021-2023 Food City 250 atBristol Motor Speedway of 133.25 miles, on dirt; the shortest Cup Series race since the rule change was the1992 Watkins Glen race, which was 125.127 miles (51 laps) because of rain in an era before NASCAR began racing in rain.)
Western 500Richard Petty andBobby Allison made important debuts in their careers - Petty debuted under the sponsorship ofSTP while Allison was making his maiden voyage with the Richard Howard Chevrolet underJunior Johnson's control.A. J. Foyt won the pole in thePurolator Mercury but fell out with transmission failure. Allison started 16th but stormed through the field and led 102 laps before falling to second at the end. Fog shortened the race to 149 laps as Petty led 37 of the final 39 laps, driving for the final time in an all-blue racecar.
Daytona 500 Foyt was unchallenged after Petty fell out with engine failure 80 laps into the 500 and cruised to his only Daytona 500 win and first win at the track since 1965. Petty led 31 laps, Foyt 167, andBobby Allison led two, indicative of the slump in competitive depth of the series with the withdrawal of the factories from participation.Bobby Isaac won the pole inHarry Hyde's Dodge but the engine soured on the start and Isaac finished 33rd, whileBuddy Baker crashed withWalter Ballard, who flipped in the trioval grass.
Richmond 500 Petty, Allison, and Isaac led all 500 laps and finished 1-2-3; Isaac though was seven laps down whileDave Marcis and Bill Dennis finished in the top five, both at least twelve laps down.
Miller 500Ontario Motor Speedway hosted NASCAR for the second straight year and the battle was between Foyt, Petty, Baker, Allison, and Isaac, while West Coast aceRay Elder andBenny Parsons also led. 51 cars started with over 30 additional entries sent home after qualifying. Isaac crashed withMark Donohue 45 laps in ("it's a new car and it's totaled out," said the dejected Isaac) while Petty lost a lap on a botched pitstop; he push-drafted Baker and Allison to keep them challenging Foyt ("Foyt was ridiculously faster than my Chevy down the straights," Allison said), but the #21 was too much and Foyt took what would be his final NASCAR win.
Carolina 500Bobby Allison won the pole but had to start 39th in the field atNorth Carolina Motor Speedway after changing tires following qualifying. He stormed through the field to lead 260 laps, but at Lap 345 his engine failed. Isaac led 210 laps for the win, only his third big-track Grand National win and what would be his final career Grand National win. The race occurred two days following the birth of future cup championMatt Kenseth.
Atlanta 500 Working to solve the engine issues plaguing the team,Junior Johnson began usingUnion aviation oil for the #12's engines.Bobby Allison won the pole and engaged in a race-long duel withBobby Isaac; he escaped a hard crash withRon Keselowski. Late in the raceA. J. Foyt stormed to the front but Allison grabbed the lead with four laps to go and edged Foyt and Isaac for the first superspeedway win forChevrolet in some eight years.
Rebel 400 TheWood Brothers hiredDavid Pearson to drive their #21 withA. J. Foyt having to serve hisIndycar commitments. Pearson responded by leading 202 laps and winning for the first time since March 1971.Richard Petty finished a lap down in second; the 1-2 finish began one of the most celebrated periods in NASCAR history.Bobby Allison led 29 laps but finished a very distant (15 laps down) seventh.Joe Frasson finished third.
Gwyn Staley 400 Petty, Allison, andBobby Isaac dominated the race and finished 1-2-3. Petty led the last 25 laps after a late tire change where his team put on "gumballs" (softer compound tires). The racing between the three became heated during the day, Petty calling it "a wing-doolie" of a race.
Virginia 500 The Wood Brothers usually entered only at Martinsville for a short track effort and David Pearson led 102 laps but his transmission broke while leading and he was done with thirty laps to go; he still finished eighth. Bobby Allison won the pole and led 27 laps to finish second; Bobby Isaac led 268 laps but blew his engine while leading and finished 19th. As a result Richard Petty despite being on seven cylinders had his fourth win of the season.
Winston 500 The lead changed 53 times as Isaac, Pearson,Buddy Baker, and Petty battled withFred Lorenzen, driving aHoss Ellington #28.Bobby Allison led early but fell out with engine failure. Petty cut a tire late and lost a lap, and coming to the white flag Isaac was sideslammed by lapped traffic, giving Pearson the lead for the win, his second in the Wood Brothers Mercury.
World 600Bobby Allison won the pole (the second straight 600 pole for the racecar owned by track promoter Richard Howard) and led 239 laps, but blew both right side tires with 30 laps to go andBuddy Baker took the win.Richard Petty andBobby Isaac fell out with engine failures as didWendell Scott, driving a second Chevrolet out ofJunior Johnson's shop.
Motor State 400 David Pearson led 154 laps in an easy win, finishing sixteen seconds ahead ofBobby Allison and half a lap ahead ofRichard Petty.Pete Hamilton drove a Jim Ruggles Plymouth and raced with the leaders before falling out in the final 50 laps.
Lone Star 500 Petty battledBobby Isaac in 100-degree heat atTexas World Speedway before Isaac faltered and Petty beatBobby Allison by a full lap; Petty held a slender point lead overJames Hylton, who had come under fire earlier in the season for leading the points race despite finishing behind Petty and Allison almost every race. PrivateerRichard Childress was involved in a bizarre crash when he spun inLeonard Faustina's oil and flipped into a ditch.
Firecracker 400 The finish turned into an exciting three-car shootout betweenDavid Pearson, Petty, and Allison. Petty tried to muscle past Pearson up high on the homestretch but came six feet short, with Allison hard on Pearson's trunk at the stripe.Coo Coo Marlin finished fourth after being briefly detained by Daytona police three days prior when a bar brawl accidentally swept up Marlin's wife Eula Faye.
Dixie 500 Allison and David Pearson led 285 of 328 laps but Allison took his third big-track win of the season when Pearson slowed with a souring engine, withRichard Petty a distant second.
Talladega 500James Hylton edged outRamo Stott in the biggest upset of the season after 32 of 50 entries failed to finish the race. The top qualifiers crashed out on Lap 22 whenJoe Frasson blew a tire while running second; he and the other top qualifiers were using a new Goodyear compound, and the angered Frasson said the new tires "weren't worth a damn." Hylton was using year-old rubber; "I was going with the old tire anyway," he said after his second career win and first on a superspeedway.
Yankee 400 The financially troubledMichigan International Speedway held its final NASCAR race under its initial ownership aegis on August 20, andDavid Pearson got into a late duel withBobby Allison in the final 27 laps, edging Allison by one car length. Pearson won despite thealternator souring; "I was scared the final 40 laps ... I expected (the engine) to quit any lap."
Southern 500Bobby Allison battledDavid Pearson for virtually the entire 500 miles; they led 352 laps between them and at one point Pearson grabbed the lead from Allison by diving five abreast under some seven lapped cars on the frontstretch. Allison took the win with six laps to go.Richard Petty finished seven laps down due to repeated blistered tires.Buddy Baker andBobby Isaac were eliminated in separate crashes; Baker was tabbed to drive a secondHarry Hyde Dodge asPetty Enterprises could not offer him more starts in their #11 Dodge; Isaac, who'd struggled in the primary Hyde Dodge #71 all season, quit the team, saying they were not up to preparing two cars given the constant problems preparing one.
Capital City 500Buddy Baker was hired to replaceBobby Isaac inHarry Hyde's #71 and led one lap, but was eliminated in the crash that signalled the detonation of theRichard Petty-Bobby Allison feud that defined the season. Petty and Allison led 498 laps between them, but with nine to go Allison passed Petty; Petty stormed back ahead and sideswiped Allison entering Three; Allison hammered Petty and Petty shot hard into the guardrail coming out of Four, collecting Baker and getting off the ground atop the guardrail. Shockingly Petty slid back onto all four wheels still in the lead, holding on to win over half a lap.
Delaware 500David Pearson manhandled the field, leading 350 laps for his sixth win of the season, his highest win total for a season since 1969.Bobby Allison won the pole but after leading 34 laps fell out with engine failure; with Petty finishing second the points race was getting close to being clinched.
Old Dominion 500 Allison made a determined effort for a ninth win of 1972 as he started on the pole and led 432 laps. Petty cut a tire and had to pit under green, and when he came back out he was just ahead of Allison. NASCAR waved the blue "move over" flag but Petty raced Allison to stay on the lead lap. A yellow put Petty back on the lead lap and he stormed to challenge Allison for the lead. The two squared off and Petty wrestled away the win with 39 laps to go.
Wilkes 400 The Petty-Allison feud erupted into outright warfare over the final 30 laps. Allison led 203 laps until the race's lone yellow with 50 to go set off a hard fight between them; the lead changed nine times over the final 38 laps, but in the final three laps the race turned ugly when Allison, blocked off by the lapped car of Vic Parson, plowed full bore into Petty and Parsons and all three hammered the wall, but kept going; Petty crashed into Allison on the final lap and stormed to the win. An intoxicated fan attacked Petty in victory lane and was clubbed viciously byMaurice Petty using Richard's helmet.
National 500 With prerace chatter buzzing about North Wilkesboro the week before, Allison squared off withBuddy Baker in a frantic final eight laps; the lead bounced around between the two before Allison sideslammed past Baker with four to go. The Wood Brothers entered two cars, for Pearson andA. J. Foyt, finishing 3-4.
American 500 Allison outlasted Petty, Baker, and Pearson for his tenth win of the season. The four of them combined to lead 479 laps, while leading nine laps inHoss Ellington's Chevrolet wasCale Yarborough, trying to return to Grand National racing after two fruitless seasons in USAC Indycars. The race was the 39th straight race where Allison led at least one lap.
Texas 500Buddy Baker,A. J. Foyt, andRichard Petty led all 250 laps between them as they dueled for the lead and Baker edged out a close win.Bobby Allison, his relationship withJunior Johnson deteriorating all season, finished a distant fourth and left the team to re-form his own team, bringing hisCoca-Cola sponsorship with him. The Johnson-wrenched Richard Howard team announced thatCale Yarborough, ninth in the Ellington Chevrolet, would take over the seat for 1973.
Petty won the Grand National title over Allison by 128 points.
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