Looking at race pace sim in FP2, I think Max could quite comfortably run away with this. The only hope for Merc is that the drop in pace in sector 3 was due to getting the tyres in the right window vs raw grip between the two. If it’s the former, then on race day it shouldn’t have the same impact.
One surprising thing is the straight line speed of RB. They’ve run a small wing. Which on softs which have more grip, might be manageable. Merc have to hope that on the harder compounds, they have a big speed advantage where the lack of tyre grip is amplified by the lower downforce set up which RB are running to have pace on the straights.
It’s definitely looking in RBs favour, but never know.