Norris Leads Piastri in Sao Paulo Practice Session
The British driver has outperformed Oscar Piastri at all of the past five grands prix.
Lando Norris just pipped team-mate and title rival the Australian for the fastest time in the dying seconds of the practice session at the Brazilian Grand Prix.
The British racer, who grabbed the points lead from his teammate by one point after winning in the Mexican Grand Prix a fortnight back, outpaced the Melbourne-born driver by a mere 0.023s.
Before then, Piastri had been the fastest McLaren driver throughout the hour before the sprint shootout scheduled for the evening session.
The Red Bull star, the sole remaining contender in realistic title contention, trailing with a 36-point deficit behind Norris, was classified in 17th position as his Red Bull team followed a different programme.
His teammate Yuki Tsunoda was the sole competitor to have an incident, though minor, when he lost control at Turn Four soon after starting.
Tsunoda spun out over the exit kerbs before sliding over the run-off area, and was fortunate to get away with just a slight brush of the wall.
The Ferrari of Lewis Hamilton also spun, at the very end of the practice, rotating twice through the quick descending Mergulho corner leading to the last turn on to the start-finish straight.
The seven-time champion wrapped up in 19th, one place behind team-mate the Monegasque driver.
Norris and Piastri were far ahead of the other competitors, with the German's Sauber P3, 0.619 seconds behind Piastri's pace.
The Aston Martin of Fernando Alonso was fourth fastest, with the Sauber of Bortoleto in front of Mercedes' George Russell and the Alpine of Pierre Gasly and Williams' Sainz.
