Lando Norris Leads Oscar Piastri in Brazilian Practice
The British driver has outperformed his teammate at each of the last five race weekends.
Lando Norris narrowly beat team-mate and title rival Oscar Piastri for the fastest time in the closing stages of practice at the Sao Paulo Grand Prix.
Norris, who took the title advantage from Piastri by just one point after taking the win in the Mexican Grand Prix a fortnight back, topped the Australian by 0.023 seconds.
Earlier in the session, Oscar Piastri had been the fastest McLaren driver during the running before sprint qualifying due at the evening session.
Max Verstappen, the other racer in the points battle, lying with a 36-point deficit Norris, ended up in P17 as his team opted for a different programme.
Verstappen's team-mate Yuki Tsunoda was the only driver to have an incident, if briefly, when he spun at Turn Four early in the session.
The Japanese slid over the curbs on exit before spinning across the escape zone, and was fortunate to escape with just a slight brush of the fence.
The Ferrari of the seven-time champion also had a spin, at the very end of the session, turning around through the high-speed Mergulho turn approaching the final corner on to the pit straight.
Hamilton ended the session in 19th place, just behind team-mate Charles Leclerc.
The McLaren drivers were well clear of the rest of the field, with Nico Hulkenberg's car third fastest, over half a second behind Piastri's pace.
The Aston Martin of Fernando Alonso was fourth fastest, with Sauber's Gabriel Bortoleto fifth from Mercedes' Russell and Alpine's Gasly and Williams' Carlos Sainz.
