Argentinian amateur racing driver who also represented his country at sailing
The Argentinian sportsman Roberto Mieres, who has died aged 87, was a fine example of the kind of gifted amateur racing driver who could still find a place in the grand prix races of the 1950s. At the wheel of a Gordini or a Maserati, he could be relied upon to give a decent account of himself, if seldom managing to embarrass the great stars of the day.
One of Mieres's finest performances came in the British Grand Prix of 1955, held at the Aintree circuit, formed from the perimeter road of the Grand National course. In front of a capacity crowd, he and his Maserati 250F succeeded in splitting the four cars of the all-conquering Mercedes-Benz team, leading the car of Piero Taruffi before retiring with engine failure.
Mieres was born into a wealthy family in the city of Mar del Plata, and took advantage of the opportunity to practise a number of sports, including tennis, rowing, rugby – which he gave up after breaking a leg – and sailing, in which he represented Argentina at the 1960 Olympic Games in Rome. But motor racing was his real love, and he began his career in 1947, first at the wheel of an MG and then with a Bugatti whose previous drivers included the Italian ace Achille Varzi.
In 1950 he was invited to join his compatriots Juan Manuel Fangio and José Froilán González on a trip to Europe. There, subsidised by their national motor club, they took part in several international races. Mieres's best result, at the wheel of a Maserati 4CLT-48, was fourth place in the Grand Prix of Geneva (Switzerland had not yet banned motor racing).
Back in Argentina, he raced a Jaguar XK120, but in 1953 he recrossed the Atlantic at the behest of Amédée Gordini, who offered him a seat in his team of little Simca-engined single-seaters. Mieres finished a praiseworthy sixth in the Italian Grand Prix at Monza, which was won by Fangio's Maserati, and at the end of the season he placed an order for one of the Maserati company's potent and beautiful new 250F models, on sale to private owners for £5,000 each. When delivery was delayed by several months, the factory gave him a year-old A6GCM model, updated with the 1954 engine. He drove the car, painted in his national colours of blue and white, to second place in front of his home crowd in the Buenos Aires Grand Prix. After finishing sixth in the 1954 British Grand Prix at Silverstone – one of four Argentinians in the top six on a wet day – he was invited to join the works Maserati team, alongside Stirling Moss and Luigi Musso. Fourth-place finishes in Switzerland and Spain in factory-run cars led to his retention for the following season, partnering Musso and Jean Behra.
After good finishes in the non-championship races in Turin (second), Pau (third) and Bordeaux (third again, behind his two team-mates), there was less luck once the 1955 championship proper began. He finished fourth in Holland and seventh at Monza in the last race of his grand prix career, two laps behind Fangio's winning Mercedes. The 250F he drove throughout the 1955 season was for many years to be seen in the Donington Park museum in Leicestershire.
At the end of the 1955 season, Mieres retired from serious racing to look after his business interests and pursue his interest in sailing. He returned to the track occasionally in the following years, and it is thought to have been on oil dropped from his Porsche during the 1958 Cuban Grand Prix that an inexperienced local driver, Armando Garcia Cifuentes, spun his Ferrari and crashed into the crowd, killing several spectators. The tragedy was overshadowed by the kidnapping of Fangio, the world champion, who was taken from a Havana hotel on the eve of the race and held for 24 hours by pro-Castro rebels.
Known to his fellow countrymen as "Bibito", a diminutive of his first name, Mieres spent his last 30 years on a farm in Punta del Este, Uruguay.
• Roberto Casimiro Mieres, racing driver, businessman and farmer, born 3 December 1924; died 26 January 2012