The Gold Coast SUNS pre-season campaign officially began for the main training group on Monday morning at Metricon Stadium.

The remainder of the list joined the club's first to fourth year players who returned a fortnight ago and were immediately presented with the first challenge of the summer in the form of a 2km time trial.

2015 Club Champion Tom Lynch returned to work in great condition, leading the field home, ahead of wingman Matt Shaw and veteran midfielder Michael Rischitelli.

The first to fourth year playing group didn’t partake in the fitness assessment, but joined the main training session once the older group had completed the time trial.

With Kade Kolodjashnij, Touk Miller and Alex Sexton setting the pace amongst the younger contingency during the opening two weeks of the pre-season, and Dion Prestia ticking boxes in terms of his rehabilitation from a season-ending knee injury, it will be interesting to see where Lynch fits in on the running charts.

Off-season acquisitions Matt Rosa, Dan Currie and Jarrad Grant all joined training on day one, with Rosa on restricted duties due to his late finish to the season after playing in West Coast’s Grand Final loss to Hawthorn in early October.

Captain Gary Ablett trained fully, showing no signs of the knee and shoulder injuries that limited him to just six appearances in 2015.

Fellow knee victims, Jaeger O’Meara, David Swallow and Prestia were all present on the track, completing various rehabilitation exercises as they work their way back from serious knee related injuries.