F1 Brazil GP live commentary and updates – sprint race

THAT'S IT FROM THE SPRINT

15:00 local is when qualifying kicks off – we'll see you then.

BORTOLETO IS OK

There was a slightly worrying delay before the replay of Gabriel's accident – F1 TV always waits until a driver is known to be OK before re-screening shunts.

It was a big accident. He pulled out of Hadjar's slipstream on the run to Turn 1 and his car instantly swapped ends on him. Bortoleto then nearly collected Albon's Williams en route to the barrier.

The Sauber hit the barrier very hard, taking off the front and rear wings. In-car footage shows the steering wheel detaching on impact. The team will struggle to fix that before qualifying...

Last lap, nothing doing for Antonelli into Turn 4. That looks like the battle for the lead done and dusted.

And we've got a yellow flag – big shunt for Gabriel Bortoleto at the Senna Esses when he started the final lap. 

Lap 23 and Verstappen has randomly gone purple in sector one. But he's still 1.9s off Russell.

Lap 22 and Leclerc gets by Alonso. Now Fernando has his old nemesis Hamilton to contend with.

Antonelli now right on Norris's tail. Through lap 20 he was two tenths faster through every sector.

Norris reporting on the radio that he's struggling with his rear tyres. Nil defecatum Sherlockium...

Stroll is falling off that battle for P5, now 1.7s behind Hamilton.

Antonelli got into DRS range of Norris on lap 17 but has now dropped off a bit, to 1.1s behind the McLaren.

Norris warned that the wind is getting gustier. That might account for some of the lock-ups we're seeing.

Leclerc's front-left tyre is not going to be sending him any cards this festive season.

Gasly has joined the battle for P5, albeit at some distance, 0.4s off Stroll's rear wing. He is griping on the radio that Leclerc needs to pull his finger out and get past Alonso.

Review of the start indicates how close Verstappen came to running into the back of Russell as George checked up to avoid hitting Antonelli. Then Max had to deal with a slightly out-of-control Aston Martin, since Alonso arrived with his front-left wheel locked up.

In-car footage via F1 TV reveals Alonso has now been told to lift-and-coast to save fuel. His response won't be repeated on the world feed...

Fascinating dynamic up front as Norris sets the fastest lap of the race. He's now out of DRS range, 1.403s away from Antonelli. Russell has now dropped back from his team-mate and is out of DRS range.

Verstappen not making great gains on Russell – the tightest battle is for P5, as Alonso makes it plain to the Ferraris that they are going to have to work to get past him.

Albon and Gasly also having a spirited dice for P9 – that's outside the sprint race points-paying positions, remember.

Stroll, Gasly and Albon also on softs. Our data screen is updating quite slowly. 

Rest of the field behind Albon are on used mediums by the look of it.

Looking like Verstappen and the Mercedes drivers on mediums for the restart, Norris on softs, Alonso on softs, and the two Ferraris on mediums.

All of these being previously used.

Race control says the restart will be a rolling start, which takes some of the pressure off Norris's shoulders.

That'll set the tinfoil hat merchants a-nattering!

Piastri fans will take some succour from the fact that this is a sprint race, so only low-tariff points at stake. But he's still looking at a net loss to Verstappen as well has Norris.

There's likely going to be a lot of debate about whether there was a cumulative effect of cars striking that kerb and bringing more water into the serrations on its surface. Very difficult to say based on replays alone.

The in-car replay from Bortoleto through Turns 1-2-3 makes for grim viewing – Colapinto's car was all over the place.

Hulkenberg made it back to the pits under his own power and Sauber has been given permission to repair the car, which requires new front and rear wings.

Another replay of the Lawson/Bearman incident begins from further back in time to the preceding straight, where Lawson had two wheels on the grass – which explains his post-crunch complaint about Bearman.

The Haas driver, meanwhile, harrumphs "typical Lawson".

Verstappen complaining about his car bottoming out and oversteering, race engineer Giampiero Lambiase warning him about the various areas of water to avoid. Then they begin to squabble like an old married couple, GP having the last word by saying, "I'm just giving you advice, up to you whether to take it or not."

Yes, the replays offering a "smoking gun" in the form of what went wrong there. Piastri and Hulkenberg both put their front-left wheels on the inside edge of the kerb at Turn 3, spraying plenty of water. Hulkenberg was actually slightly further inboard.

Colapinto was already engaged in a protracted arm-wrestle with his ill-handling Alpine through Turns 1 and 2 before he followed the same track through Turn 3, hitting the barrier quite hard on the outside.

As to Lawson and Bearman, Lawson clearly meets the threshold according to the drivers' guidelines – his front wheels were well ahead of Bearman's mirrors.

Replay of the start shows how strongly Hamilton got away from P11. Judged the grip perfectly and did a tightrope walk around the outside line into Turn 1.

Piastri came mightily close to giving Antonelli a tap but backed off and gave him the corner.

Race control say the incident between Lawson and Bearman at Turn 4 on the opening lap has been "NOTED".

Lance Stroll has, in the words of Depeche Mode, been going backwards – now P9 behind Leclerc and Hamilton.

DRS enabled at the end of lap two, so race control are confident about the conditions.

Lots of drivers taking the higher, drier line on the final approach to the grid.

Theoretically the softs should grip up faster at the start, so expect those Mercedes and Verstappen to make nuisances of themselves on the run to Turn 1, then again on the sprint to Turn 4.

As the late Bob Monkhouse once said, you've got to be like the man who slapped the cheerful old lady at the seance...

You've got to strike a happy medium.

So now we see it on our data screen. A mixture of used mediums and used softs. Mediums for the McLarens, softs for the Mercedes on the front two rows. Behind them, the Aston Martins also start on mediums. Softs for Verstappen, Leclerc, Hadjar. Mediums for Hulkenberg and Hamilton. Softs for Albon, then mediums for everyone south of the Williams on the grid.

We understand one of the changes made to Tsunoda's car is a rear-wing swap to a slightly higher downforce setup. The likely reason for that is to gather data for whether it might address some of the complaints Max Verstappen has been making about his car through practice and sprint qualifying.

The tyre choice will be interesting. Not that anyone will be using the hards, but yesterday the medium was the favoured tyre. Those who made it through to SQ3 and ran the softs found very little lap time improvement, if at all. But those were warmer conditions and that overnight rain will have undone much of the track evolution, so...

Our trackside team report that most of the circuit is dry enough for slicks, but the section from the final corner up to the front straight is still quite damp. So likely the field will be starting on slicks of some variety, then it will be a question of tiptoe through the tulips at the end of the lap.