Sergio Perez beats Charles Leclerc in Brazilian Grand Prix's opening practice

Sergio Perez topped the times for Red Bull ahead of Ferrari's Charles Leclerc in Friday's opening free practice at this weekend's Sao Paulo Grand Prix.

The Mexican clocked a best lap of one minute and 11.853 seconds to outpace his Monegasque rival by 0.004 seconds in a at Interlagos, where the weekend includes a sprint race on Saturday.

Two-time world champion Max Verstappen was third in his Red Bull ahead of Carlos Sainz in the second Ferrari, seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton and his Mercedes team-mate George Russell.

The top six were separated by only two-tenths of a second.

Only 0.008 separates the top three in FP1! ????Qualifying is next! ??#BrazilGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/QBWoUOJKZB

Flurry of activity

Four-time champion Sebastian Vettel, in his penultimate Grand Prix before retiring, was seventh for Aston Martin ahead of fellow-German and protg Mick Schumacher, who is fighting to keep his seat with Haas next year.

Valtteri Bottas was ninth for Alfa Romeo and Pierre Gasly 10th for Alpha Tauri in a frantic one hour's action as the teams worked intensively to find a set-up for their cars ahead of qualifying later Friday.

On a warm day with an air temperature of 24 degrees Celsius, and the track at 46 degrees, the session began with a flurry of cars on track seeking to take advantage of the only session before qualifying.

Esteban Ocon was the initial pace-setter ahead of the newly-moustachioed Valtteri Bottas. Verstappen was soon in action and ran off at Turn Four, the scene of his controversial defensive move against Hamilton last year, taking to the run-off area to recover.

Almost immediately, Perez went top before the world champion, on his next lap, took command, Bottas splitting the two Red Bulls with some aplomb. The Finn, a