Norris Edges Out Piastri in Sao Paulo Practice
The British driver has outperformed his teammate at all of the last five grands prix.
The McLaren driver narrowly beat fellow driver and title rival the Australian for the fastest time in the closing stages of the practice session at the Sao Paulo Grand Prix.
Norris, who took the points lead from Piastri by just one point after taking the win in Mexico City a fortnight back, outpaced the Melbourne-born driver by 0.023 seconds.
Earlier in the session, Oscar Piastri had been the quickest of the McLaren pair for most of the session before sprint qualifying set to begin at 18:30 GMT.
The Red Bull star, the only other driver in the championship fight, trailing 36 points behind Norris, ended up in P17 as his team ran a different programme.
His teammate Yuki Tsunoda was the sole competitor to go off, if briefly, when he spun at corner four during the early running.
Tsunoda slid over the curbs on exit before rotating through the escape zone, and was lucky to escape with just a minor contact of the barrier.
The Ferrari of Lewis Hamilton also lost it, at the conclusion of the practice, rotating twice through the quick descending Mergulho turn leading to the last turn on to the start-finish straight.
The veteran finished practice in 19th place, one place behind teammate Charles Leclerc.
The McLaren pair were significantly quicker of the other competitors, with Nico Hulkenberg's Sauber third fastest, 0.619 seconds slower than Piastri's best.
The Aston Martin of Fernando Alonso was fourth quickest, with the Sauber of Bortoleto in front of Mercedes' George Russell and the Alpine of Pierre Gasly and the Williams of Sainz.
