Abstract: A single lever manual control for marine propulsion units includes a shift gear train and a throttle gear train mounted in side-by-side coaxial relation on a rotating input shaft, said trains terminating in shift lever and throttler lever outputs respectively. Push-pull cable units couple the levers to the engine. The throttle cable has an outer sleeve pivotally mounted by a pivot arm with a pivot axis adjacent the outer wall of the control housing. A key extends through the input shaft into a shift gear having a direct drive notch and an adjacent circumferentially enlarged warm-up notch. A warm-up button is connected to a rod which engages one edge of the key. A spring-loaded pin within the shaft engages the opposite key face to resiliently establish the direct drive connection. The button is depressed and forces the rod and key into the warm-up notch and the pin into an opening in a shift lever to prevent rotation thereof. The opening and pin are only aligned in neutral.