Ryan Lochte to Matt Lauer: I ‘Over-Exaggerated’ Rio Robbery Story

NBC has released the first excerpt of Matt Lauer’s exclusive interview with Olympic swimmer Ryan Lochte, who is under fire for apparently fabricating a story about he and his teammates getting robbed at gunpoint in Rio. “I over-exaggerated that story,” Lochte admitted, one day after he posted an apology online. The man who confronted the athletes with a gun was a security guard demanding they pay for damage they caused to a gas station bathroom, a fact that was reportedly explained to them, in English, at the time. As Lauer put it, Lochte’s original story was about the “mean streets of Rio” whereas his new version is “much more about a negotiated settlement to cover up some dumb behavior.” In response, Lochte said that was why he was now “taking full responsibility for it” and blamed his own “immature behavior.”