Fernando Alonso overshadowed title contenders Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa yesterday, setting the fastest time in practice for tomorrow's decisive Brazilian Grand Prix.

The two-time Formula One champion clocked 1 minute, 12.296 seconds with his Renault at the 4.3-kilometre Interlagos track, edging home-crowd favourite Massa of Ferrari by 0.057 seconds in the second practice session.

Toyota's Jarno Trulli had the third-fastest time of the day with 1:12.435, followed by championship leader Hamilton of McLaren with 1:12.495. Hamilton clocked 1:12.827 in the afternoon session, good only for ninth.

Massa, who needs to erase Hamilton's seven-point lead entering the season-ending race, was quickest in the first session with a time of 1:12.305, beating Hamilton by .190.

Massa led most of the second session before Alonso clocked the fastest time in his last lap at the track .

Both sessions took place under cloudy conditions, and light rain fell at times. The temperature was lower than usual for this time of the year in South America's biggest city at 17 degrees Celsius. Forecasters said it should get warmer during the weekend, but there is an 80 percent chance of rain during the race tomorrow.