Ryan Lochte admits he 'over-exaggerated' Rio robbery story

US Olympic swimmer Ryan Lochte waded further into the controversy over a claim he and other US swimmers were robbed at gunpoint in Rio, apologizing for "over-exaggerating" his story.

In an interview Saturday, NBC's Matt Lauer challenged Lochte's earlier version of the story, after nearly of week of conflicting accounts about the ordeal.

Fellow US Olympic swimmer Gunnar Bentz released a statement Friday that seemed to implicate Lochte as an aggressor in the encounter Sunday night, in which Bentz, Lochte, Jack Conger, Jimmy Feigen stopped at a gas station on their way back to the Olympic Village in Rio.

According to Bentz's recollection of the incident, armed security guards demanded money from the group after Lochte allegedly damaged some property at the gas station.

Lochte said he took "full responsibility" for what happened, but appeared to stop short of disavowing his original interpretation of the matter, in which he painted himself and the others as victims.

"It's how you want to make it look like," Lochte told Lauer. "Whether you call it a robbery, whether you call it extortion, or us paying just for the damages, like, we don't know." 

"All we know is that there was a gun pointed in our direction, and we were demanded to give money," he added.

Watch a portion of the interview below: