Lando Norris says qualifying for the Sao Paulo Grand Prix brought "some of the wettest conditions" in which he had ever driven - and he is hoping for more rain in the race on Sunday.

It was the third consecutive year in which Norris has taken pole in Brazil, and it came in a session that was stopped for nearly an hour and a half because conditions were too dangerous to continue when officials initially tried to start it.

Many drivers agreed that conditions were borderline in the extreme.

Mercedes driver George Russell, who qualified second to Norris and was miffed about a team miscommunication that he felt robbed him of pole, said: "Q1 was extremely challenging. The visibility was zero down the straight into Turn Four. I was wheel-spinning in fifth gear, over 200km/h (120mph), aquaplaning.

"When you're aquaplaning on the straight and you can't see in front of you, it's... I'm not even sure what the word is to describe it.

"It does seem a bit crazy. I guess that's what we have to deal with.

"I love driving in the rain. I love driving in the rain here, but at some point, if that was a race, there was no way we should be driving in that because the chances of seeing a really, really horrific incident are very, very high."

The rain - combined with grid penalties for four of the usual front-runners, including Russell - has produced an unfamiliar grid with several drivers exploiting the opportunity of the weather to produce their best results of the year.

Racing Bulls' Liam Lawson - who still does not know whether he has a seat next year - and Audi's Nico Hulkenberg occupy the second row.

Haas driver Oliver Bearman is sixth, and Aston Martin's Fernando Alonso and Williams' Alex Albon in eighth and ninth both made it into the top 10 for the first time in 2026.

Ferrari's Lewis Hamilton and Red Bull's Max Verstappen, who won this race in the wet two years ago from 17th on the grid, start 20th and 21st after replacing their engines and exceeding their allowance for the year.

Hamilton's team-mate Charles Leclerc, who qualified fourth, has a 10-place penalty, also for engine usage.

Sunday's forecast is for light rain, and the unpredictability of the weather at the Interlagos track, which is famous for it, means the teams and drivers will be open-minded about what to expect.

Norris had not taken pole since the Spanish Grand Prix in September, and although his McLaren has upgrades on it, which he acknowledged had improved the car, he felt he owed it to the conditions.

"We're lucky it's wet, because if it was dry, I wouldn't be sitting here," said Norris. "In the dry, we definitely didn't have the pace.

"We've looked better this weekend but we still had some small issues, and we've not been up to the pace of the Mercedes. The wet kind of gave me an opportunity and I made the most of it.

"I'm hoping for a wet race. There's a good likelihood it'll be wet. There's a bit of rain, I think, tomorrow at times, and it'll still be damp through the day, so we could just have an exciting race with a little bit of everything, honestly.

"These are conditions where you feel like you can make a little bit more of a difference at times, for sure. And I feel like I'm against good guys who also have the capabilities of going for pole, and today we managed to do it because I put two good laps together and I had a good gap, and we managed things well.

"It was tense when you want to push so much. You need to kind of learn about the conditions, but you also need to not make a single mistake.

"But actually, I felt pretty confident through the whole of qualifying. Q3 was definitely the trickiest because it was also difficult to see, because of the light, where were the dry bits, the wet bits and puddles, things like that. So, more rewarding."

For Russell, there was another disappointment in a season that has been full of them.

Last weekend, he had to watch team-mate Kimi Antonelli clinch the world title and become the youngest champion in history.

Here, he felt pole was his had he not been told to back off on what he felt would have been his fastest lap after he came across Albon in the twisty middle sector.

The team felt the imminent heavier rain would hold off long enough for him to do another lap. They were wrong, and Russell swore over the radio asking what had happened.

He was reminded by team boss Toto Wolff that he was still P2, to which he responded, short-tempered, that he was not there to be second.

It might have seemed a loss of perspective, given his five-place grid penalty meant he would not have been on pole even if he had been fastest.

But for Russell his feelings were rooted in self-validation after a difficult year, and it was not related to the fact that it promoted Antonelli to second.

"Gives me the confidence and reminds me again that I haven't forgotten how to drive," he said. "That's important in circumstances like these and it would have meant a lot to me to clinch the pole with a great performance like we showed in qualifying."

He added: "I felt really confident in the rain. I think my pace, along with Lando's, was by far the best out there.

"In the rain here, it's always a challenge. I hope it is wet tomorrow. I feel I've got a greater chance if it's wet."

The wet conditions provided Alonso with a chance to demonstrate the waste of talent that this year's uncompetitive Aston Martin-Honda car has created.

With its down-on-power and difficult engine, Alonso has been struggling all year. There have been few chinks of light.

This was a rare opportunity to shine, and he took it.

Up at the sharp end throughout, he dropped away - if only relatively - in the final session when he could not get temperature in his tyres. It may have been because he was first in the queue in the pit lane in his eagerness to get in a lap time before the rain worsened again.

"We took some risks in Q1, in Q2, where the conditions were a little bit unknown for everybody and we made it through and then our first Q3 of the year, so obviously pleased with that," Alonso said.

"Then in Q3 I was expecting maybe a little bit more. I was first on the queue. But the tyres were ice cold in Q3, so I had no grip.

"But yeah, I look at the times now, I think P6 is 1.8 seconds in front of me. So yeah, it's way too much, you know, in front to really dream about any higher positions.

"There is less time full throttle (in the wet), because there is no grip. So obviously they cannot exploit the extra power.

"But still the engine is very important in terms of drivability and the way it behaves in the corners. We still have a little bit of an issue there.

"But no, I think these conditions is more about the level of risk you want to take. There is a little bit of aquaplaning here and there."

Alonso joins Norris and Russell in hoping for a wet race, feeling that if it's dry he will inevitably sink back to Aston Martin's natural level, especially with the long pit straight where Honda's lack of power will render him defenceless.

The race promises much with Leclerc, Hamilton and Verstappen all aiming to make progress from the back, even if the drivers feel that overtaking at Interlagos will be harder in this year's new-style cars than before.

For Ferrari, it has been a difficult weekend, that started with clear-the-air talks between Leclerc and Hamilton after their first-lap battle cost them victory in Mexico last weekend.

Both took new internal combustion engines, which gave them 10-place grid penalties, and then Hamilton's brand new one broke in final practice. So Ferrari gave him another one, leaving him at the back with Verstappen.

The two multiple champions will be in competition to see who can make progress faster, and perhaps Ferrari are not so unhappy that Hamilton and Leclerc are separated by six places on the grid.

Both drivers said all was well after their chat on Thursday evening.

Leclerc - who returned to Europe between the two races to be at the birth of his first child, a daughter named Bianca - said: "It was good to speak. This is always needed after a moment like this. It took proportions that are way too big, but it has been around also for way too long.

"At the same time, it was a very special week for me, so I couldn't really have those discussions before. And it was important to have those discussions, but now I consider that a closed chapter, and it will be important to look ahead.

"I really believe that when we speak, things are much better straight away. Of course, there is tension. Of course, we want to finish ahead of each other, and sometimes we are not going to do things right. And it's OK sometimes to disagree on the way you see things, but at the same time, discussing about those then helps a whole lot."

Hamilton added: "Me and Charles sat and spoke and we squashed it, and we're moving on.

"We still have a huge amount of respect for each other and I'm glad we had a chat and now we move on.

"We've been getting along just fine as normal. Sometimes in those scenarios it takes having a conversation and there's been no demands from either side.

"It's both just giving our points and areas we can do better and support each other."