Williams Racing will start the 2024 Qatar GP from the 8th and 10th rows of the grid after a busy day in Lusail that featured the season's final Sprint.
Alex Albon missed out on Q2 by just 0.026s after sitting P15 in the latter stages of Q1 but dropping down in the dying seconds to finish P16.
Meanwhile, Franco Colapinto was just two-tenths off in his first Qatar Qualifying experience, finishing in P19.
These are one places below where the Williams Racing duo finished the day's earlier 19-lap Sprint, with Alex finishing the short-distance race in P15 and Franco in P18.
A frantic first lap had Alex smartly navigating a busy midfield scrap and avoiding picking up any damage but dropped down to P15 by the second sector.
Franco started his race from the pit lane after making some changes under Parc fermé but immediately made up a position.
Sergio Perez lined up ahead of our Argentinian driver, but Franco's quick reactions when the pit lane light turned green had him pull alongside the Red Bull.
He overtook Perez by the time the two reached the end of the pit exit, and began closing the gap to the remaining drivers from the grid.
Alex's Sprint was spent staying close to Esteban Ocon in P14, but unable to progress while comfortably keeping Liam Lawson behind.
There was a little more action for Franco, who used a set of fresh Pirelli medium tyres to advance on Zhou, who ran the soft compound.
A DRS pass down the pit straight let the FW46 cross the line in P18, and one of only a few drivers to make any overtakes during 2024's farewell to Sprint.
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"We just weren’t quick enough today and we have been struggling with that all weekend," Alex commented.
"Teams like Alpine and Stake have been bringing upgrades, so we’ve just fallen a little behind.
"We made some good changes between the Sprint Race and Qualifying, but it wasn’t quite enough; we also got caught out a little bit with wind at the end of our Quali lap.
"Tomorrow we’ll try to learn and do the best job that we can but it’s not easy to overtake here so we’ll have to see what we can do."
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Franco continued our reaction by sharing: "It didn’t feel very comfortable to drive today and we struggled with the balance in Qualifying which made it very tricky for us.
"We changed the suspension in Parc Fermé which meant that we hadn’t had the chance to do a low fuel run in this set-up and we paid the price a little bit.
"We also made some changes after the Sprint Race, but maybe it wasn’t quite in the right direction.
"It’s a pity because the gaps were very tight, but our long run pace yesterday was strong, so we will focus on pushing tomorrow and see how it goes."
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"Not the result we wanted today as we struggled to find the performance needed to be competitive," Sven Smeets, Sporting Director, concluded.
"Both cars were eliminated in Q1 although it was very close for Alex to move into Q2 but he had a snap and lost time in the last corner of his final lap.
"We’ll see what we can do tomorrow as our long run pace on Friday was competitive but it’s difficult to overtake here so it will be a hard fight to gain some places."
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