The invention relates to a method for operating a vehicle with a drive device (20) which has at least one internal combustion engine (21) as a drive machine, wherein a drive torque requested by a driver of the vehicle (1) is implemented by operating at least the internal combustion engine (21) on a roadway (2), comprising the following steps: a) Monitoring the roadway (2) for road users (3) travelling ahead, by means of a surroundings sensor system (5), b) Monitoring a driver of the vehicle (1) by means of a state sensor system (8) with respect to his request to carry out an overtaking process in order to overtake a detected road user (3) travelling ahead, and if a request to carry out an overtaking process has been detected, c) Actuating the drive device (20) to prepare the overtaking process in such a way that before the overtaking process is carried out a torque reserve of the internal combustion engine (21) is built up.