Norris hands over Qatar F1 Sprint victory to Piastri to return the favour in Sao Paulo

Having dominated proceedings in the Qatar F1 Sprint, McLaren driver Lando Norris returned the favour he received at the the Sao Paulo Grand Prix, handing the victory over to his team-mate Oscar Piastri on the last lap. F1Technical’s lead journalist Balazs Szabo reports on the 19-lap sprint race.

Pole-sitter Lanso Norris had a great start to hold on to the first place while his team-mate Oscar Piastri managed to pikc off second-placed George Russell at Turn 1. However, the Australian ran wide which enabled Norris to pull out over a second worth of lead.

In the meantime, Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton picked off Charles Leclerc on the first lap while newly-crowned four-time world champion Max Verstappen had a bad start, falling back to ninth.

Nico Hulkenberg picked up two places at the start, jumping to seventh, ahead of Alpine racer Pierre Gasly.

On Lap 4, Russell attempted a move into Turn 1, but Piastri had the racing line, and defended his second position. Reflecting on the battle, a Russell said: "He """"" turned in on me."

The next lap saw Norris drop back in a bid to give his team-mate DRS which helped him defend himself from Russell. In the meantime, Leclerc dropped back by two seconds from Hamilton.

By Lap 8, a DRS train was formed at the front of the field, with the two McLaren, two Ferrari and two Mercedes drivers having followed each other in close proximity.

A lap later, Verstappen managed to blast past Gasly on the main straight, and started his march towards Haas driver Nico Hulkenberg.

On Lap 13, Sauber driver Zhou Guanyu elected to pit for a set of new mediums after his soft tyre gamble failed.

On the same tour, Leclerc completely closed in on Hamilton. Having made a brilliant start, the seven-time world champion failed to keep himself in DRS range to Sainz which enabled his future team-mate Leclerc to attempt an overtaking move. The future team-mates were side by side into Turn 2, and while Hamilton tried to come back at him into Turn 3, the Ferrari man managed to nudge ahead.

On Lap 16, Norris started to complain about his tyres, claiming that he is "starting to struggle with the fronts." However, the Briton was told to continue to help his team-mate in his own battle with Russell.

Further back, Perez pitted for a new front wing, with Red Bull having used the Qatar F1 Sprint as a test session with the Mexican driver, who started from the pit lane.

Despite his encouraging pace early on, Verstappen did not manage to eat into the gap to Hulkenberg at all, with the margin remaining at 1.5s.

Russell attempted two overtaking moves in the closing stages of the race into Turn 1, but he failed to pick off Piastri, which meant that the field headed in unchanged order for the last tour.

There was a significant change though as Norris slowed down coming out of the last corner to pull aside and hand the win to his team mate. It later emerged that it was a payback for Brazil, when Piastri led on merit and let Norris through when Norris needed the extra points in the drivers' championship.