How Hungarian driver Ferenc Szisz became Grand Prix racing’s first winner

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.