Oscar Piastri led Lando Norris to a McLaren one-two in sprint qualifying at the Sao Paulo Grand Prix.
Norris’ title rival Max Verstappen could manage only fourth place in the Red Bull, behind Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc.
Verstappen, who has a five-place grid penalty for the main grand prix on Sunday, starts the weekend 47 points ahead of Norris in the championship.
The result of sprint qualifying gives Norris an opportunity to claw back a small amount of points on Verstappen in Saturday’s sprint event, in which there are eight points for a win, seven for second and so on down to eighth.
But Norris said he was not thinking about the championship.
“I hate this question so much,” he said. “I’m just going to race. I don’t care about where he qualified. For me it’s just focus on my own job. It’s the same question every time. It doesn’t matter. If he’s first or last, I will do the best I can.”
Norris set the pace on the first runs in the final shoot-out, Norris with a lap of one minute 8.928 seconds lap, with Piastri just under 0.3secs slower.
But Norris failed to improve on his second lap and Piastri edged him out by just 0.029secs.
“A big improvement compared to early today,” Norris said. “We were struggling a lot (in practice). A little bit surprised we were so quick today, but a pleasant one. A good lap. I made too many mistakes on my final lap and just pitted.”
Verstappen was 0.320secs adrift in fourth place, and just 0.056secs slower than Leclerc.
Verstappen said that bumps on the freshly resurfaced track were exposing one of the Red Bull’s key flaws.
“As soon as we went into qualifying, it looked like we were definitely off,” he said.
“A bit difficult on the bumps. They did the resurfacing but I think they made it worse to drive. It is extremely bumpy everywhere and that is not good for our car. On all the bumpy areas the car is jumping around a lot and it is costing me quite a bit of lap time.
“For tomorrow, when you are already quite a bit off over one lap, we are not particularly the strongest in the race. There is some weather around that can come but not for the sprint maybe.”
Leclerc said he did not expect to be able to challenge the McLarens in the race, despite Ferrari having won the last two grands prix.
“I’m happy because we have maximised the result for today,” Leclerc said. “McLaren are so fast. We are a little bit on the back foot this weekend and it will be important to take strong points.
“We will give it everything to put a challenge on them but seeing the pace they have shown today I think they were particularly strong.”
Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz qualified fifth for the sprint, ahead of Mercedes’ George Russell.
The second Mercedes of Lewis Hamilton was knocked out in the second session and will start the sprint 11th.
“Pretty bad,” Hamilton said, “but same as every qualifying for me. I just don’t have any confidence in the car, so big struggle for me.
“The ride is pretty bad on the track for everyone. The track has been resurfaced and they’ve not done a particularly good job. The thing is hopping through all the corners, so very difficult to drive.”
Verstappen’s team-mate Sergio Perez suffered the same fate, in 13th.
