Norris Tops Piastri in Sao Paulo Practice
The British driver has beaten Oscar Piastri at all of the past five grands prix.
The McLaren driver narrowly beat team-mate and championship contender Oscar Piastri for the quickest lap in the closing stages of practice at the Sao Paulo Grand Prix.
Norris, who grabbed the championship lead from his teammate by just one point after taking the win in the Mexican Grand Prix recently, outpaced the Australian by a tiny margin of 0.023secs.
Earlier in the session, Oscar Piastri had been the fastest McLaren driver for most of the session before sprint qualifying due at 6:30 PM GMT.
Max Verstappen, the other racer in the points battle, sitting 36 points behind Norris, ended up in P17 as his Red Bull team opted for a alternative strategy.
Verstappen's team-mate Yuki Tsunoda was the only driver to go off, albeit lightly, when he rotated at the fourth corner early in the session.
Tsunoda lost control over the curbs on exit before spinning across the run-off area, and was fortunate to get away with just a light touch of the wall.
Ferrari's the seven-time champion also spun, at the final moments of the practice, spinning around through the high-speed Mergulho turn leading to the final bend on to the start-finish straight.
The seven-time champion ended the session in 19th place, trailing team-mate the Monegasque driver.
The McLaren drivers were significantly quicker of the other competitors, with the German's Sauber in third, 0.619 seconds behind Piastri's best.
The Aston Martin of Fernando Alonso was fourth quickest, with Sauber's Gabriel Bortoleto in front of the Mercedes of Russell and Alpine's Pierre Gasly and Williams' Sainz.
