Ryan Lochte ‘Not Doing Well’ Amid Backlash Over Rio Olympics Scandal

Ryan Lochte is reportedly “not doing well” in the wake of his 2016 Rio Olympics robbery scandal.

A source close to Ryan recently spoke out about how the swimmer is doing after it was exposed that he “exaggerated” a story claiming he was robbed at gunpoint during his trip to Brazil for the Olympic Games, and it turns out he’s not doing so well amid the negative attention.

Lochte, who took home a gold medal in the men’s 4x200m freestyle relay during the event earlier this month, is reportedly now stepping back from the spotlight following the Olympics drama and is “re-evaluating everything” according to an insider who spoke to E! News.

The source told the site that Ryan now “feels like his life is crumbling under him” after his Olympics lie was exposed and supposedly “really does feel bad” about what he called “over exaggerating” the incident that hit the headlines earlier this month that has since seen Lochte lose a number of lucrative endorsement deals.

According to E! News, Lochte wasn’t prepared for the seriously negative backlash that came from his skewed retelling of the robbery and “honestly did not think this was going to be blown out of proportion like it was” after he claimed to have been robbed at gunpoint while on a night out in Rio amid the games.

“[Ryan] just felt like he had to keep up with this lie or else,” the source said of Lochte’s statements about the robbery. “After everyone found out the truth he knew it was over.”

And it sounds like it really could be over for Ryan Lochte, as BBC News recently confirmed that Ryan has lost a slew of lucrative endorsement deals in the wake of the Olympics robbery scandal.

The site reported that businesses including Speedo, Ralph Lauren, Syneron-Candela, and Airweave have all cancelled their deals with the disgraced swimmer in the days that followed Lochte’s Olympics scandal.

And it sounds like Lochte is now also being shunned by his fellow Olympians, and particularly those on Team USA, who believe that Ryan’s comments about the robbery made them all “look bad.”

E! News confirmed this week that Ryan’s fellow athletes are most definitely “not happy” with Lochte’s recent behavior and “all think that this was a really wrong move” that put the entire team in a bad light.

But while it looks like almost everyone has turned his back to Ryan amid the scandal, E! News confirmed that there is still one person in the Olympian’s corner, his girlfriend Kayla Reid, who “has been there for him during this mess.”

The latest reports about how Ryan is coping amid the Olympics scandal comes shortly after Lochte admitted that he “over exaggerated” the incident during an interview with NBC Nightly News‘s Matt Lauer.

“I over-exaggerated that story and if I had never done that we wouldn’t be in this mess,” Ryan told Lauer during the interview according to a report by CNN, admitting that he made some “immature accusations” that were caused by “intoxication” during a night out in the Brazilian city.

“It’s how you want to make it look like,” Lochte continued of the robbery scandal. “Whether you call it a robbery or whether you call it extortion or us paying just for the damages. We don’t know. All we know is there was a gun pointed in our direction and we were demanded to give money.”

Lochte then went on to apologize to Brazil and all those involved in the interview. “I just want to say I am truly, 110% sorry,” Ryan said.

What do you think of reports claiming that Ryan Lochte is “not doing well” amid the Rio Olympics scandal?

[Photo by Paul A. Hebert/Getty Images]