The first race to carry the official moniker of ‘Grand Prix’ was the 1906 Grand Prix de l’Automobile Club de France, held at a circuit near Le Mans. It was, appropriately enough, won by a 90CV Renault, but the man driving it was not one of several French star drivers but a Hungarian mechanic-turned racer. His name was Ferenc Szisz.
Szisz was a genial fellow by all accounts, most notably his own description of how he won the race, which appeared in the German newspaper Algemeine Automobil-Zeitung later that year. He had been born September 20th, 1873 in Szeged, in Hungary’s Theiss lowlands between Subotica and Timisoara. Having trained as a locksmith his career as a mechanic was interrupted by his military service with the cavalry regiment stationed on the Russian-Galizian border.
