Lando Norris Leads Piastri in Sao Paulo Practice
The British driver has outscored Oscar Piastri at all of the past five grands prix.
The McLaren driver edged out team-mate and championship contender the Australian for the top spot in the dying seconds of the practice session at the Brazilian Grand Prix.
The British racer, who grabbed the title advantage from his teammate by one point after winning in Mexico City a fortnight back, outpaced the Melbourne-born driver by a mere 0.023s.
Before then, Piastri had been the leading McLaren during the running before the sprint shootout scheduled for 18:30 GMT.
The Red Bull star, the other racer in the points battle, trailing with a 36-point deficit Norris, was classified in P17 as his team followed a different programme.
Verstappen's team-mate Yuki Tsunoda was the sole competitor to have an incident, though minor, when he spun at the fourth corner soon after starting.
Tsunoda lost control over the curbs on exit before rotating through the gravel trap, and was lucky to get away with just a minor contact of the wall.
The Ferrari of the seven-time champion also spun, at the very end of the practice, spinning around through the fast downhill Mergulho turn before the final bend on to the start-finish straight.
The seven-time champion finished practice in 19th, trailing team-mate Charles Leclerc.
The McLaren pair were significantly quicker of the rest of the field, with Nico Hulkenberg's car P3, 0.619secs slower than Piastri's pace.
Aston Martin's Fernando Alonso was in fourth, with the Sauber of Bortoleto fifth from Mercedes' George Russell and the Alpine of Gasly and Williams' Sainz.
