RYAN LOCHTE told NBC Nightly News in an interview Saturday that “it was my immature behavior” that got him and his fellow Team USA swimmers into trouble, and he admitted he “overexaggerated” the story about the supposed gas-station robbery.

    The Olympics swimmer sat down with NBC’s Matt Lauer for his first interview since he was indicted for misleading local authorities. Two days before, it was revealed that Lochte lied to officials about an alleged robbery that took place in Rio.

    In the interview, Lauer asked Lochte how he felt about being called “vandals” by the Brazilian authorities and if he felt any guilt for his teammates. Lochte told Lauer that he’s been laying low since he got home because he wanted to make sure his teammates were home “on U.S. soil.”

    When Lochte admitted that he exaggerated the part of the story with the gun, Lauer asked him why. “I don’t know why,” said Lochte simply, “I shouldn’t have said anything.”

    In response to the Brazilian officials calling Lochte and his teammates “vandals,” Lochte said, “Whether you call it a robbery, whether you call it extortion or us paying just for the damages — we don’t know.” He continued, “All we know is, there was a gun pointed in our direction, and we were demanded to give money.”

    “I overexaggerated that story, and if I had never done that, we wouldn’t be in this mess,” Lochte told Lauer, admitting that he “definitely had too much to drink that night.”

    Lochte also apologized to his fellow Olympians for taking attention off them and their achievements in Rio as people watched his “immature antics” instead of their medal wins, saying that “I took away from their accomplishments about this story, about me being immature for one night. I took away from that, and that’s what I think hurts me the most.”

    Later, in an interview with Globo TV, he apologized to the people of Rio: “Brazil doesn’t deserve that,” said Lochte, “I am sorry that my immaturity caused all this ruckus.”

    Gunnar Bentz, one of the four U.S. swimmers involved in the Lochte case, has given his side of the story in a lengthy statement published Friday night.

    Bentz, who arrived back in the U.S. on Friday, said that he did not lie to police about what happened, and insisted that no one vandalized a restroom at the gas station where the incident took place. He did, say, though, that Lochte pulled down a metal advertisement and then got into a yelling match with two security guards. “I cannot speak to his actions,” Bentz wrote.

    In a detailed account, he said that Lochte “pulled to the ground a framed metal advertisement that was loosely anchored to the brick wall” and claimed “Ryan and the security guards had a heated verbal exchange” but said no guns were pulled.

    (SD-Agencies)