"I felt I had two or three makeable putts on the back nine to make it a better round, but if the cameras had been on the front nine they would have thought I was a seven handicapper so I'm pleased overall," said the South African, who will be 45 tomorrow.

"They've given me a nice early tee time so I can spend the whole day celebrating," he joked. 

"I feel for Miguel with the food poisoning, I've had that myself and it's not nice. But it's not me against him, there's 156 players in the field.

"The [Hong Kong Golf Club] captain gave me the full treatment this morning.  Showed me everything, gave me the history lesson of the whole thing.  It's quite something.  It's a very unique club with wonderful membership and wonderful champions. 

Watch: Ernie Els gets a tour of the club

"I saw the list and it's a Who's Who of golf.  But I don't even want to think about that.  Let's talk about trying to get a good round tomorrow and take it from there.

"You know, it really doesn't matter where you are now.  You want to have a good round the first day.  It's easy to shoot yourself out of it.  At first there's quite a lot of pressure and then you take it from there.  Each day, it's like a session in cricket.  You take the session and do as best as you can, and then it all happens on Sunday afternoon."

4pm

-6 Jyoti Randhawa

-5 Angelo Que

-4 Nicolas Colsaerts, Raphael Jacquelin,  Lu Wei-chih, James Heath, Nacho Elvira

-3 loads of fellas 

No sooner did Els and Bourdy join the group on -4 than they left it, both bogeying 15. Nacho Elvira is back in there as is English journeyman James Heath, another who could use a good finish to keep his card

Leader Jyoti Randhawa recently divorced his Bollywood star wife so should have more time to devote to the important things in life, golf. 

“Today I really putted my heart out so I’m very happy with the way it went.”

3:30pm

-6 Jyoti Randhawa

-5 Angelo Que

-4 Nicolas Colsaerts, Raphael Jacquelin, Ernie Els, Lu Wei-chih, Gregory Bourdy

-3 loads of fellas 

Bit of movement happening now, with a few joining the group on -4. Gregory Bourdy, a former winner here, has gone birdie-birdie-eagle-birdie over his last four, while Jbe Kruger is up there too after his fourth birdie in an otherwise spotless round. Lu Wei-chih of Taiwan has also had a fifth birdie of the day to join them. Six on -4 now, 14 on -3

3:30pm

-6 Jyoti Randhawa

-5 Angelo Que

-4 Nicolas Colsaerts, Raphael Jacquelin, Nacho Elvira, Ernie Els

-3 loads of fellas 

The Big Easy is moving up there after a second birdie in a row on 13. Spaniard Nacho Elvira, who is danger of finishing outside the top 110 and losing his European Tour card without a strong finish to the season, is also into the -4 group after a solid 14 holes with only one bogey.

Here's an update on some local and Chinese players. 

There's only three mainlanders in the field, experienced pros Liang Wenchong and Zhang Lianwei both finished level par. At the other end of the scale, 17-year-old amateur Liu Yan-wei is one under after seven holes. He's played in 12 events this year, mostly in China and Japan, missing the cut in 8. He finished 74th at the prestigious BMW Masters in Europe last year.

"On the practice green before a round, I asked Liu if his father ever gave him a day off. “Nope,” he said, flashing a grin. “Only work.” Over the one holiday even factory workers take off — Chinese New Year — Liu’s father visits for two weeks, evaluating his son’s progress. Instead of vacation time, Liu said, “that is my jail time.”"

Hong Kongers: Timothy Tang and amateur Roderick Staunton were level par, then it's Wong Woon-man (+1), Shinichi Mizuno (Am, +2), Michael Wong (Am, +3 after 16), Wilson Choy (+4), Jason Hak Shun-yat (+4 after 14), Martin Liu (Am, +7) and Doug Williams (Am, propping up the entire field on +9)

3pm 

-6 Jyoti Randhawa

-5 Angelo Que

-4 Nicolas Colsaerts, Raphael Jacquelin

-3 loads of fellas, including Ernie Els

Ernie Els is moving steadily towards the top of the leaderboard, three under after 12 holes. Following a bogey on the first, he's birdied 2, 5, 8 and 12 and is looking good. Six more holes for him to join the likes of Randhawa and Que

His playing partner and fellow major winner YE Yang is having a bit of a mare though, six over with three double bogies on his card. He's right down the bottom, where the worst score of the day is +9

Speaking of bad scores, Robert Jan-Derksen finished +6, then found himself wheeled out to educate some local kids as part of a Hong Kong Golf Association initiative to introduce golf into primary schools. Hopefully he showed them what not to do after today's effort, which featured four bogies in a row

2:20pm 

-6 Jyoti Randhawa

-5 Angelo Que

-4 Nicolas Colsaerts, Raphael Jacquelin

-3 loads of fellas

No big moves on the leaderboard. Ernie Els out in 32, two under. 

Here's what in-form Belgian Nicolas Colsaerts - fourth and second in his last two tournaments - had to say about his round. He was one shot away from the magic number, 59, in Portugal last week, but doesn't reckon Hong Kong is that type of course. Also featuring an insight into the finer points of grass and jet lag.

"Well, you need to play good to shoot any score under par I think.  You easily get yourself in trouble [here] if you don't hit the fairway, you don't really get it close, because the greens are rolling quite fast.

"I'm curious to know how many times some of the guys got close to 60, how many chances [in their career] they had.  I'm curious to see how close I can get to another 59 again.  I don't think you can go that low out here.  You really need to be on an A++ kind of game to give yourself that kind of chance on this course.

"We haven't played Bermuda grass for quite some time so takes a little bit of adjustment.  I'll be curious to see how the Europeans play this week.

"I'm waking up in the middle of the night.  None of my bags showed up until Wednesday morning probably two hours before the Pro Am.  I didn't do a very good effort at trying to get into the jet lag, and done pretty badly.

"So I think I'm going to be up or waking up quite early in the middle of the night for most of the week, but that's fine."

1.40pm

-6 Jyoti Randhawa

-5 Angelo Que

-4 Nicolas Colsaerts, Raphael Jacquelin

-3 loads of fellas

Not much exciting to report in the last half-hour. Leaderboard has a settled look to it until the late starters get on to the back nine. 

Raphael Jacquelin, one of those, has made an early move, four under after seven holes with birdies on 2, 3, 4 and 6.

Ernie Els is at one under after his second birdie of the day, on 5

1pm

-6 Jyoti Randhawa

-5 Angelo Que

-4 Nicolas Colsaerts

-3 loads of fellas

+2 defending champion Miguel Angel Jimenez

We have a new leader at lunchtime here, with Indian Randhawa Jyoti birdieing his last two holes to go to six under. He started with a bogey but was then flawless, with birdies at 4, 9, 10, 12, 13, 17 & 18.

Meanwhile, the Big Easy has started his round bogey-birdie-par-par. Playing partner and fellow major winner YE Yang is three over though, after an adventurous start: birdie on two,  double bogey on three, triple on four

1230pm

-5 Angelo Que

-4 Nicolas Colsaerts, Jyoti Randhawa

-3 loads of fellas

+2 defending champion Miguel Angel Jimenez

Defending champion Miguel Angel Jimenez is finished for the day on two over, and has just told us, in considerable detail, that he's been suffering from food poisoning.

"I was up all night vomiting and sh**ing," he says. "I even had to go into the woods at one point. I feel terrible, but I'm a professional and had to play." 

We'll spare you the more gory details about the state of his behind. Some dodgy seafood might have been the culprit he reckons, before heading off for some "plain white rice". Two over not bad in the circumstances and he hopes to be in better fettle tomorrow.

Meanwhile, Angelo Que has finished on five under for the day to be clubhouse leader. No bogies in a perfect round for him. Belgian Nicolas Colsaerts had just one bogey to lie one shot further back. Indian Jyoti Randhawa has two holes left to take the outright lead. 

11:55am

-5 Angelo Que

-4 Nicolas Colsaerts, Jyoti Randhawa

-3 loads of fellas

+2 defending champion Miguel Angel Jimenez

My colleague Alvin Sallay has been out talking to a couple of local players, Roderick Staunton and Timothy Tang. Amateur Staunton, who has taken time off from his job at HSBC today and tomorrow, was three under at one point before slipping back late on to finish even. He knows the course well - his father was captain here and president of the HK Golf Association.

Roderick Staunton: "I think reality caught up with me a little bit on the last few holes ... just a couple of misses in the wrong spots. But hopefully something to work on tomorrow. I thought of turning pro a long time ago, but the reality is i don't think i'm good enough. It's nice to play in events like this once in a while. The boss has been good about me taking time off and we'll see what happens

Meanwhile, Timothy Tang, who qualified by finishing top of HK order of merit also had a decent day, finishing level par, as he tries to get his Asian Tour card: "I'm trying to get back on the Asian Tour, played there in 2011 but lost my card. I'll go to the qualifying school in January. I'm playing here and next week in Macau."

11.15am

Selected: 

-5 Angelo Que 

-4 Scott Hend

-3 Danny Chia, Nicolas Colsaerts

E Roderick Staunton

+3 Miguel Angel Jimenez

Not going well for defending champion Jimenez here. He's +3 now with only four holes left. Maybe he overdid the vino tinto last night.

Angelo Que, who did well last year and likes this course, is still out on front, with Malaysian Danny Chia close behind coming down the last. Scott Hend has stormed up there after three consecutive birdies.

Hong Kong amateur Roderick Staunton has fallen away a bit to par after three bogies in his last four holes. He only has one left, the 10th

10.40 am

-5 Angelo Que

-4 Alastair Forsyth

-3 Danny Chia, David Lipsky, Lam Chi-bing

-2 Roderick Staunton (am) 

Good morning and welcome to the first round of the 56th Hong Kong Open as Hong Kong Golf Club celebrates its 125th anniversary.

Spanish veteran Miguel Angel Jimenez, the oldest player ever to win a European Tour event is out to make it three titles in a row here, and an unprecedented five in total. He's not off to a great start though, two over after eight holes with bogies on 16 and 18 as he started on the back nine. Major winners Ernie Els and YE Yang are yet to tee off.

Scotland's Alastair Forsyth was the early leader, with four birdies in a front nine of 30. He was -4 after 12, but has just been overtaken by Angelo Que of the Philippines. Meanwhile, local amateur Roderick Staunton is going well, two  under after 15. 

The weather's fine, warm with barely a breath of wind and as birds chirp in the trees you wouldn't know that protestors are camped in the streets just a few miles and a world away. 

Stick with us for regular updates throughout the day. Meanwhile, catch up with our preview coverage here: