Norris Leads Piastri in Brazilian Practice Session

Lando Norris just pipped team-mate and championship contender the Australian for the fastest time in the dying seconds of the practice session at the Brazilian Grand Prix.

The British racer, who seized the championship lead from his teammate by a single point after taking the win in the Mexican Grand Prix recently, outpaced the Melbourne-born driver by a tiny margin of 0.023secs.

Earlier in the session, Piastri had been the quickest of the McLaren pair for most of the session before the sprint shootout due at 6:30 PM GMT.

The Red Bull star, the only other driver in realistic title contention, sitting 36 points behind Norris, ended up in 17th place 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 lost control at the fourth corner during the early running.

The Japanese spun out over the curbs on exit before spinning across the escape zone, and was lucky to avoid just a slight brush of the fence.

The Ferrari of the seven-time champion also had a spin, at the conclusion of the session, rotating twice through the fast downhill corner leading to the final corner on to the start-finish straight.

The veteran ended the session in P19, trailing team-mate Charles Leclerc.

The McLaren drivers were significantly quicker of the other competitors, with the German's car P3, 0.619secs slower than Piastri's best.

The Aston Martin of Fernando Alonso was fourth quickest, with the Sauber of Gabriel Bortoleto ahead of Mercedes' George Russell and the Alpine of Gasly and the Williams of Sainz.