The Friday program of the Brazilian Grand Prix continued with the sprint qualifying, the big winner of which was Oscar Piastri.
The first few laps of SQ1 were interesting and it was already obvious that this stage would bring serious fireworks: on the constantly improving track we saw Liam Lawson in the lead, then Oscar Piastri, and finally Lando Norris pulled this stage ahead of his teammate and Alexander Albon. The two Aston Martins, Yuki Tsunoda, Guanyu Zhou and Esteban Ocon were among the names eliminated.
In SQ2, Norris once again took the lead, followed by Oscar Piastri and Max Verstappen, and there was no question about the top three. Behind them, however, almost anything could have happened, and it could have turned out any way. Who would have thought, for example, that Oliver Bearman, who had stepped in due to Kevin Magnussen's illness, would easily advance to SQ3? We are not surprised by Sergio Perez's farewell, but the simple elimination of Lewis Hamilton and Nico Hülkenberg - since both of their teammates advanced - was even more shocking, while Franco Collapinto and Valtteri Bottas could not continue their fight.
In the final stage of sprint qualifying, the battle was now on soft compounds, and the balance of power reversed: Oscar Piastri was the fastest, and ahead of Lando Norris and Charles Leclerc, he can start from the first grid in the sprint race of the Brazilian Grand Prix.
