It had been well documented that Australia's top three players, Jason Day, Adam Scott and Marc Leishman, were sitting out the Olympics due to the risk posed to their young families by possible exposure to the Zika virus. Fraser also said he was here for his family. "My kids kept telling me I'm going to the Olympics," he said after his round. "Later in life, they'll be able to say Dad went to the Olympics; that's a big reason I wanted to come here."

Seven-year-old Archie and five-year-old Lily, staying with their grandparents in Melbourne while Marcus attends the games with his wife Carlie, would wake on Friday morning to learn that Dad was Olympic leader and Olympic record-holder in the sport's first appearance at the games since 1904.

Making nine birdies and one bogey on the par-71 course at Barra de Tijuca, Fraser was able to build momentum ahead of a freshening sea breeze that blew away the mere thought, let alone the reality, of a mosquito.

The links-style course, he said, reminded him of the Melbourne sand belt. Less familiar was the sight of alligators in a pond, owls in the trees and a capybara that Ian Baker-Finch had a dust-up with, the team captain running for cover after getting too close to take a photo.

On and off the course, Olympic golf is different. Fraser said he noticed an unusually sociable atmosphere in the locker room. "It's so different to every other week when we're playing for ourselves," he said. "This week we're playing for Australia first, and then for ourselves. The Olympics is the Olympics. What more can you say?"

With many of the world's best electing not to compete, there was almost a militant attitude from those who came, who include major winners Henrik Stenson, Martin Kaymer, Padraig Harrington, Bubba Watson, Danny Willett and Justin Rose, as well as top-liners such as Sergio Garcia, Matt Kuchar, Patrick Reed and Ricky Fowler.

"I think it's a little bit disrespectful to some of the players who are here that they talk more about the guys who stayed home," said former world No.1 and two-time major winner Kaymer. "I said yesterday to the German coach, no matter what happened this week, it was the greatest week of my life, it really was.

"The passion you see from the athletes – there's one gymnast, a German guy [Andreas Toba], he did something to his leg, and he still went on to the horse, and he still competed for the team. And he was in so much pain. You know, compared to them, we're so weak in terms of our attitudes sometimes. They put all of their heart in there. And then some people, some players, even from other sports, they don't come here, and you think, 'How can you not want to come here?'

British Open champion Stenson, the world's hottest golfer this year, said: "I haven't really spent time or energy trying to figure out why certain players didn't want to be here. I think 10 years down the line you are going to look at who won the gold medal rather than who wasn't here."

Fowler said he had been on social media "doing a pretty good job" of making friends such as Jordan Spieth envious. The main attraction for many of the elite golfers was to star-spot in the Olympic village.

England's Willett, the reigning US Masters champion, said he was most excited by sitting in the dining hall with Wimbledon champion Andy Murray and heptathlete Jessica Ennis.

Irishman Harrington, a three-time major winner who has been a prime mover in gaining Olympic status for golf, said: "You are a golfer and you're having breakfast, lunch and dinner in the international village and instead of being there 20 minutes you're there one hour later watching people. It would be great if it said on the back of the [shirt of the] people you see, what sport they play. Because everyone's going, "I wonder what they play?" There's all shapes and sizes down there, littlest to the tallest, slim and wide, everything."

Stenson said the biggest challenge was not to do something silly in the gym. "I was in the gym on Sunday evening and if you want to get motivated that is definitely the place to be," he said. "I didn't try and go for some dead lifts on 80, 90kg when there is some guy holding 180kg straight up on both arms."

Fraser had also been playing sports fan, attending the Australia-US men's basketball match on Wednesday and also watching his friend Sam Groth play tennis.

The South African duo of Jaco Van Zyl and Brandon Stone spoke for most of their colleagues when summing up the experience. "The fun we are having in the village is phenomenal, interacting with the other athletes, it's brilliant, absolutely brilliant. It would be a sin not to be here," Van Zyl said. "We just have to wipe the drool off every now and then."

Added Stone: "The golf is actually getting in the way, we want to just go and watch something else."

There is no cut for the Olympic golf tournament, however, so they will have to wait until Monday before they can go out and be spectators.