Lando Norris strolled into the paddock at Interlagos on Friday morning looking fit and well after a bout of food poisoning had sidelined him from Thursday's media duties with McLaren.
As a precautionary measure, the Woking-based outfit had prepped Mercedes reserve Nyck de Vries for an eventual one-off with the team in Sao Paulo.
McLaren and Mercedes have had an agreement in place since last year that allows the papaya squad to call upon one of the Brackley team's reserve drivers if necessary.
McLaren had therefore conducted a seat fitting with de Vries on Thursday to cover its options in case Norris had not recovered in time.
But on Friday morning McLaren confirmed on social media that Norris would be up and running in FP1.
Had de Vries subbed for Norris, it would have been the Dutchman's fourth outing with a different team this season, having previously run in free practice with Williams, Mercedes and Aston Martin, not to mention his remarkable F1 race debut with Williams at the Italian Grand Prix.
The latter rewarded de Vries with a full F1 season next year with AlphaTauri.
Welcome back to the paddock, @LandoNorris. 👊#BrazilGP 🇧🇷 pic.twitter.com/IXmw9MfKgA
— McLaren (@McLarenF1) November 11, 2022
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