On the back of regular success in kart racing in his native Brazil, Ribeiro graduated to Formula Ford, before heading to Europe to compete in the 1990 Formula Opel championship.
He then moved to Britain to race in F3 for Paul Stewart Racing for six races, finishing sixth at Silverstone. PSR kept him on for 1992 and, although outperformed by team-mate Gil de Ferran, he scored a third and a pole position, again at Silverstone.
A move to Fortec Motorsport in 1993 led to him taking poles at Silverstone and Brands Hatch and three podiums and consistent finishing elsewhere resulted in fifth in the championship.
For 1994, Ribeiro moved to the US and entered Indy Lights with Tasman Motorsports alongside Steve Robertson.
Robertson beat Ribeiro to the Lights crown, but the Brazilian still impressed with four wins and four poles and runner-up in the championship.
That earned Ribeiro a ride with Tasman in CART Indycars in 1995 and, although the early Honda unit struggled for reliability in the back of Tasman’s singleton Reynard, a fourth place at Road America was encouraging.
Then at the one-mile New Hampshire Motor Speedway, Ribeiro took pole and drove Honda to its first Indycar win.
The following year, now using a Lola chassis, Ribeiro delivered two more wins, one a glorious home win ahead of Al Unser Jr on Rio de Janeiro’s demanding D-shaped oval, the other coming at Michigan’s superspeedway ahead of Bryan Herta and compatriot Mauricio Gugelmin. He also took pole at Toronto, and eventually finished 11th in the championship.
The 1997 season was a struggle for Ribeiro and Tasman, although a mid-season switch from Lola to Reynard led to a small uptick in performance, including a third place at Toronto and fourth at Laguna Seca.
Ribeiro then got what should have been a dream call-up to Team Penske alongside Unser Jr, but Roger’s squad was going through a dreadful period when the package of the Penske PC-27 chassis, the Mercedes-Benz engine and Goodyear tyres was emphatically not the combo to have, and his best result was a seventh place in Vancouver.
Ribeiro retired from racing at season’s end, aged just 32 and, in partnership with Roger Penske, ran car dealerships in Brazil.
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