Lando Norris Leads Piastri in Sao Paulo Practice Session
The British driver has outperformed Oscar Piastri at each of the last five race weekends.
The McLaren driver just pipped fellow driver and championship contender Oscar Piastri for the quickest lap in the closing stages of the practice session at the Sao Paulo Grand Prix.
Norris, who grabbed the championship lead from his teammate by just one point after winning in Mexico City recently, outpaced the Melbourne-born driver by 0.023 seconds.
Earlier in the session, Piastri had been the leading McLaren during the running before the sprint shootout set to begin at 6:30 PM GMT.
Max Verstappen, the only other driver in the championship fight, trailing 36 points behind Norris, ended up in P17 as his Red Bull team ran a different programme.
Verstappen's team-mate Yuki Tsunoda was the sole competitor to have an incident, though minor, when he rotated at the fourth corner soon after starting.
Tsunoda slid over the curbs on exit before spinning across the gravel trap, and was blessed to avoid just a slight brush of the fence.
The Ferrari of the seven-time champion also had a spin, at the very end of the session, rotating twice through the quick descending Mergulho corner before the last turn on to the main straight.
The seven-time champion wrapped up in 19th place, one place behind team-mate the Monegasque driver.
Norris and Piastri were well clear of the rest of the field, with the German's car third fastest, 0.619secs behind Piastri's best.
The Aston Martin of the Spanish driver was fourth quickest, with Sauber's Bortoleto ahead of the Mercedes of Russell and the Alpine of Pierre Gasly and Williams' Carlos Sainz.
