Lando Norris Leads Piastri in Sao Paulo Practice
The British driver has outperformed Oscar Piastri at all of the previous five grands prix.
The McLaren driver narrowly beat team-mate and title rival the Australian for the fastest time in the closing stages of practice at the Brazilian Grand Prix.
The British racer, who grabbed the title advantage from his teammate by one point after his victory in Mexico City recently, outpaced the Australian by a tiny margin of 0.023secs.
Until that point, Oscar Piastri had been the leading McLaren throughout the hour before sprint qualifying set to begin at 18:30 GMT.
Max Verstappen, the only other driver in the points battle, lying 36 points behind behind Norris, ended up in 17th position as his team opted for a alternative strategy.
Verstappen's team-mate Yuki Tsunoda was the only driver to crash, albeit lightly, when he spun at the fourth corner during the early running.
The Japanese spun out over the curbs on exit before rotating through the run-off area, and was blessed to avoid just a minor contact of the wall.
The Ferrari of the seven-time champion also spun, at the final moments of the practice, spinning around through the high-speed corner approaching the last turn on to the pit straight.
The seven-time champion finished practice in P19, trailing team-mate the Monegasque driver.
The McLaren pair were significantly quicker of the other competitors, with the German's Sauber third fastest, 0.619secs off Piastri's best.
Aston Martin's Fernando Alonso was in fourth, with the Sauber of Gabriel Bortoleto fifth from Mercedes' George Russell and Alpine's Gasly and Williams' Carlos Sainz.
