Philip Reid talks to last year's winner of the Volvo Masters, who yesterday turned around a mediocre season with a fine opening score of 66.

Some would have viewed it as a nightmare draw, but not Anders Hansen. Having qualified on the wire for the Volvo Masters, in the last counting position, but with three defections reducing the starting field to 57 players, the Dane suspected that he would be the one given the first tee-off time with nobody except a marker for company.

Just as the early bird invariably catches the worm, Hansen made the most of his draw. With the course in pristine condition - "I couldn't find any spike marks, and couldn't find any divots," he remarked - the 33-year-old stole a march on everyone but Fredrik Jacobson, firing an opening round six-under-par 66 that suggested a season that had included nine missed cuts, including six-in-a-row, had belatedly turned the corner.

Hansen, winner of last year's Volvo PGA Championship, scraped into the tournament in 60th place by making the cut in last week's Madrid Open. But such a mediocre season hinted he would do no more that make up the numbers on a Valderrama course that penalises anyone not on top of their game. Yet, on arguably the toughest parkland course in Europe, Hansen found form that had deserted him for much of a long season.

"It's been frustrating," he admitted. "I felt a lot of weeks I played well, hit the ball well but just couldn't score. There were times I hit the ball well on the range before going out but then missed a lot of cuts from nowhere. It's been a strange season, a very strange season."

What would make it stranger still, you suspect, is if Hansen were to go out and win one of the tour's flagship tournaments. But, then, stranger things have happened this season.

In scooting around the course yesterday in a mere two and a half hours - with his lady marker struggling to match strides with him - Hansen claimed: "My one fear was that I would go out and play too quickly and not really feel that I was playing in a tournament.

"I kept my concentration levels high, didn't rush things too much."

On the first occasion that Hansen visited Valderrama, he claimed "I didn't think much of it."

His love for the course, though, has grown so that each round he has played has brought an appreciation of its nuances.

"The more you play, the more you like it. You start to find out where to hit it, where the tricky parts are and now I think it is a great course.

"Condition wise, you're not going to see any course better and I can't believe how well it has drained."

Yesterday, Hansen had the distinction of going around without incurring a bogey, which is some achievement in itself, and a sign of how well he played was that the longest of his birdie putts was on the 18th, where he sank a 15-footer.

Although he has grown to love the course, that finishing hole is one that still has him flummoxed.

"You know, I've played that 18th a number of times and I still don't know how to play it. I just teed it off with a driver down the left and sent out a prayer, and the prayer was answered. I was in the fairway."

It remains to be seen if the rest of his prayers are answered over the next three rounds.