Léon Théry was born in 1879. Having started out as a mechanic it was said that his mechanical knowledge helped him to understand the need to drive according to the car’s abilities, often nursing his car home to victory when others had fallen by the wayside. His first race was the Paris to Amsterdam in 1898 at the wheel of a voiturette. In 1900 he won the cup for voiturettes on the road from Bordeaux to Periguez and competed in several hill climbs. Most of his early racing was behind a Decauville, a French maker of locomotives.
The 1904 Gordon Bennett’s cup was held in Germany’s Taunus Forest at the suggestion of Kaiser William II and drew entries from eight countries. At the time it was considered the single most important race in the world. The course stretched over 550 km in the pine forest, consisting of four laps that started from the ancient Roman bastion of Saalburg heading north to Usingen, where there was a control point (an inhabited or built up area where the cars had to travel slowly under the supervision of course officials). Other control points were established at Grävenwiesbach to Weilburg, then past Allendorf and Obertiefenbach to Limburg. The last section was reported to be the best part of the course for high speed and in practice some cars traveled at 150 km/h. After Limburg the course ran through Kirberg to Neuhof, Idstein then ran through Glashütten to Königstein, via Friedrichshof and Oberursel to Homburg and back to Saalburg where they arrayed spectacular grandstands fit for a Kaiser.
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