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Lando Norris narrowly beat fellow driver and title rival the Australian for the top spot in the dying seconds of practice at the Sao Paulo Grand Prix.

The British racer, who grabbed the points lead from his teammate by just one point after winning in the Mexican Grand Prix recently, topped the Melbourne-born driver by a mere 0.023s.

Earlier in the session, Piastri had been the fastest McLaren driver throughout the hour before the sprint shootout scheduled for the evening session.

The Red Bull star, the other racer in the championship fight, sitting 36 points behind Norris, was classified in P17 as his Red Bull team ran a different programme.

His teammate the Japanese driver was the sole competitor to have an incident, though minor, when he rotated at Turn Four early in the session.

The Japanese slid over the track edges before sliding over the run-off area, and was blessed to escape with just a slight brush of the fence.

Ferrari's the seven-time champion also spun, at the final moments of the session, rotating twice through the fast downhill Mergulho turn before the last turn on to the start-finish straight.

The seven-time champion wrapped up in 19th, trailing teammate Charles Leclerc.

Norris and Piastri were significantly quicker of the rest of the field, with Nico Hulkenberg's Sauber P3, 0.619secs behind Piastri's best.

Aston Martin's the Spanish driver was fourth fastest, with Sauber's Gabriel Bortoleto ahead of the Mercedes of Russell and the Alpine of Pierre Gasly and the Williams of Sainz.