Olympic rower shares gruesome photo of hands after expedition

Sept. 1 (UPI) -- British Olympic rower Alex Gregory showed the toll the sport can take on an athlete's hands after a grueling expedition.

Gregory, a two-time Olympic gold medallist, tweeted a photo of his heavily blistered and wrinkled hands during an expedition in the arctic.

"My hands after spending so long in wet gloves," he wrote.

The gruesome photo showed off Gregory's pale, swollen hands covered in deep wrinkles and large blisters after being soaked in the freezing water.

"The blisters were never bad on this Polar row, but the wet and damp seeped into the skin," he wrote.

Gregory and the Polar Row team planned a two-stage Arctic expedition from Tromso, Norway, to the town of Longyearbyen, but were forced to cut it short after boat complications left them stranded on a remote island.

"I've never been so wet and cold for so long," Gregory said. "It's seeping into my bones, there is absolutely no escape from it."