Ernie Els happy to think his way round at ISPS HANDA Senior Open

The Gleneagles Hotel may be well inland but two-time Open Champion Ernie Els is looking to take a links approach at the ISPS HANDA Senior Open.

The world's best over-50s are this week taking on the parkland test of the King's Course, although the recent dry and warm weather is making it feel very firm and fast.

It was still proving gettable, however, as Els proved with an excellent 65 contaning six birdies and a single dropped shot in round one.

And while he admitted an agressive approach could well bring dividends, the South African was planning on using all his guile in the hunt for a first win at Europe's only Senior Major.

"You've got keep your wits with you, you know?" he said.

"You can be really aggressive. If you're on you can be really spectacular.

"It's a course where you've got to tack yourself around. The course is running a little bit, so you can hit linksy shots and play the wind.

"And the greens are tricky to read, tricky to putt. I think that's why scoring is going to level out a little bit."

Els birdied the second, sixth and ninth to turn in 31 and then added another gain on the tenth. His only dropped shot came on the 13th but he picked it straight back up before a smart up-and-down brought a gain on the last.

"I kept it under control," he said. "I had a nice start. Birdied the second hole. I had a good up-and-down on four. I played the front nine quite well. Made some putts. The greens are quite smooth this morning, so hopefully it stays like that.

"Then the back nine, I made a silly mistake on 13. It was really downwind. It was really hard to make bogey there. All in all, it was a solid round.

"I had a week off last week. I was down in London. So I played a bit of golf but really nice to have a nice start today."