Oscar Piastri suggested he is ready to go toe to toe with Lando Norris over the course of this weekend's São Paulo Grand Prix after the sole practice session at Interlagos.
Piastri has endured a miserable run of late, resulting in him losing his championship lead going into this weekend, trailing McLaren team-mate Norris by a point, and with Red Bull's Max Verstappen 35 points behind the Australian.
At the double-header in the United States and Mexico, in particular, Piastri was at a loss to understand the performance of his car, in comparison to Norris, who delivered a perfect weekend last time out at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez to take over at the top of the drivers' standings.
Piastri confirmed that answers to his struggles had been discovered, but refused to elaborate as to what they were. In one radio message during the hour-long session, he did state at one stage that, "there's a lot more rear grip now".
He finished second quickest to Norris by just 0.023s, with the two drivers the only ones to dip below 70 seconds for a lap, with the rest of the field, led by Sauber's Nico Hulkenberg, a long way adrift.
As for Verstappen and Ferrari's Lewis Hamilton, they were a lowly 17th and 19th respectively, although their fastest times were both set on the hard tyres.
Result Free practice 1 - Brazilian
Tsunoda misses key running
Following a five-minute delayed start due to what the FIA described as "general track cleaning", the drivers wasted no time in taking to the track for the only practice session ahead of sprint qualifying later in the day.
Given Norris set the benchmark in FP1 last year with a 1:10.610s, the early laps on hard tyres were nothing more than sighters. For obvious reasons, the times tumbled with almost every passing lap.
With Piastri the early leader, after eight minutes, Yuki Tsunoda suffered an early scare in his Red Bull. Out of the Turn 4 left-hander, Tsunoda rode the rumble strip on the corner of T5 that immediately spat him into a spin.
With all four tyres locked as he slid sideways across the concrete run-off, Tsunoda clipped the edge of a barrier with his front-left wheel. That spun him around, leading to him then hitting another barrier with the right rear.
The Japanese driver was at least able to continue and return to the garage for checks and repairs. It proved a costly off, confining him to the garage for 27 minutes due to damage sustained to the front and rear wings.
On the hard rubber, with the three compounds this year a step harder than those of a year ago, Russell took over the top spot with a lap of 1:11.188s at the 15-minute mark, two-tenths of a second quicker than Verstappen, and three-tenths up on Leclerc.
There followed a session within the session of higher fuel, hard tyre running over numerous laps. On one, Verstappen made a minor error that forced him wide out of T4.
After missing the long runs, Tsunoda was sent straight out on the softs, with his first significant lap still three-quarters of a second behind Russell's leading pace on the hards before improving on a second run, but still 0.575s down.
On medium rubber, Aston Martin's Lance Stroll moved to within 0.162s of Russell, before Williams' Alex Albon, and then team-mate Carlos Sainz went fastest, the latter with a 1:10.820s. Russell's first medium-tyre burst saw him finish 0.096s adrift of Sainz.
Piastri then purpled all three sectors to deliver a superb 1:10.193s, 0.278s clear of Norris. Both drivers improved on their second runs, with Piastri dipping below 70 seconds with a 1:09.998s, with Norris still 0.261s adrift.
Norris had one last burst available, posting a 1:09.975s to edge out Piastri, with Hulkenberg third quickest, but 0.619s down.
As for Verstappen, who finished 1.393s down, he aborted his run on the soft tyres two-thirds of the way through the lap, although he seemed to be short on pace anyway, as appeared to be the case also for Hamilton, who suffered a late spin.
In between the pair was the second Ferrari of Charles Leclerc, whose best lap was also on hard tyres. The only driver slower than the trio was Tsunoda.
Behind Hulkenberg, whose only F1 pole was 15 years ago to the day at Interlagos, was Aston Martin's Fernando Alonso, followed by home hero Gabriel Bortoleto in the second Sauber.
Russell was sixth quickest, followed by Pierre Gasly in an Alpine that he said had not felt so alive for months, with Sainz, Racing Bulls' Isack Hadjar and Mercedes' Kimi Antonelli completing the top 10, the latter eight-tenths of a second down.
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