Lando Norris Leads Oscar Piastri in Sao Paulo Practice Session
The British driver has outscored his teammate at each of the previous five grands prix.
The McLaren driver just pipped fellow driver and title rival Oscar Piastri for the top spot in the dying seconds of the practice session at the Brazilian Grand Prix.
Norris, who grabbed the points lead from his teammate by a single point after winning in the Mexican Grand Prix a fortnight back, topped the Australian by a mere 0.023s.
Before then, Piastri had been the fastest McLaren driver for most of the session before the sprint shootout set to begin at 18:30 GMT.
The Red Bull star, the only other driver in realistic title contention, trailing 36 points behind Norris, finished in P17 as his Red Bull team opted for a unique setup.
Verstappen's team-mate Yuki Tsunoda was the sole competitor to have an incident, if briefly, when he lost control at corner four early in the session.
The Japanese lost control over the curbs on exit before sliding over the gravel trap, and was fortunate to get away with just a minor contact of the wall.
Ferrari's the seven-time champion also lost it, at the very end of the session, spinning around through the high-speed corner leading to the final corner on to the main straight.
The seven-time champion ended the session in P19, trailing teammate Charles Leclerc.
The McLaren pair were significantly quicker of the rest of the field, with the German's car P3, 0.619secs slower than Piastri's pace.
Aston Martin's Fernando Alonso was fourth fastest, with the Sauber of Bortoleto fifth from Mercedes' Russell and the Alpine of Gasly and Williams' Carlos Sainz.
