A procedure to control the drive unit in motor vehicles wherein: the maximum engine performance characteristic is determined; as a minimum engine performance characteristic, a reference performance characteristic is specified by how drive resistance depends on vehicle speed at a medium payload of the motor vehicle; above the reference performance characteristic, a first performance characteristic which is dependent on actual driving speed is defined and allocated a minimum assessment value; between this first performance characteristic and the maximum engine performance characteristic, a second performance characteristic which is also dependent on actual driving speed is defined and allocated a maximum assessment value; the current engine performance is determined; current assessment values are determined by comparing current engine performance to the first performance characteristic and the second performance characteristic; the current assessment values, as continuously determined, are filtered over time in this way, filtered assessment values are obtained; and these filtered assessment values are used to select drive unit control parameters, or parameter sets, which then are used to control the drive unit.