Lando Norris Edges Out Piastri in Brazilian Practice
Lando Norris has beaten his teammate at all of the last five race weekends.
The McLaren driver narrowly beat fellow driver and championship contender the Australian for the top spot in the dying seconds of the practice session at the Brazilian Grand Prix.
Norris, who grabbed the points lead from Piastri by one point after taking the win in the Mexican Grand Prix recently, outpaced the Australian by 0.023 seconds.
Earlier in the session, Piastri had been the leading McLaren during the running before the sprint shootout due at 6:30 PM GMT.
Max Verstappen, the other racer in the points battle, 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, if briefly, when he spun at corner four soon after starting.
Tsunoda slid over the track edges before sliding over the escape zone, and was lucky to get away with just a minor contact of the wall.
Ferrari's the seven-time champion also had a spin, at the final moments of the session, spinning around through the quick descending Mergulho corner leading to the final bend on to the main straight.
The seven-time champion ended the session in P19, one place behind teammate Charles Leclerc.
The McLaren drivers were far ahead of the rest of the field, with Nico Hulkenberg's Sauber third fastest, 0.619secs off Piastri's best.
Aston Martin's Fernando Alonso was fourth fastest, with the Sauber of Bortoleto ahead of the Mercedes of Russell and Alpine's Pierre Gasly and the Williams of Carlos Sainz.
