During a recent appearance on the MMA History Podcast, Olympic gold medalist Mark Schultz made a claim about Foxcatcher financier John du Pont: that the eccentric millionaire had his testicles surgically removed following a horse-riding accident and lived the rest of his life as a eunuch.
Schultz, who trained at du Pont’s Foxcatcher Farm in the late 1980s, says du Pont confided in him personally. According to Schultz, the incident occurred during du Pont’s pentathlon days, when one of his mother’s horses bucked him off during an equestrian jump and he landed straddling a fence.
“He lands right on his testicles and they get infected and they have to be removed,” Schultz said. “And he lives the rest of his life as a eunuch.”
The conversation happened at Foxcatcher Farm while du Pont was making Schultz a sandwich, making a considerable ceremony of the task. After handing it over, du Pont told Schultz that in his 20s or 30s, he had been thrown from one of his mother’s Lucidor Farms horses, landing on a fence.
“After he told me that, I walked out of the room,” Schultz said, adding that the revelation suddenly made many things about du Pont click into place. “I could see his lack of testosterone. I could see the effeminate characteristics in his facial pictures, everything.”
Schultz noted that du Pont’s higher-pitched voice, narrow build, and distended midsection were all consistent with what he described as the body producing estrogen. Du Pont had been prescribed testosterone replacement therapy but, Schultz said, “he forgot sometimes and I think he forgot a lot more times than he remembered.”
The claim carries a darker dimension. Schultz recounted what a law enforcement psychiatrist explained during a departmental briefing: that removing a predatory person’s testicles does not reduce dangerous behavior but can intensify it.
The theory holds that a form of remorse follows certain releases, and when that release becomes impossible, the predatory cycle escalates rather than diminishes.
“By that byproduct is they actually magnify their evil,” the host said. “It actually turns it up like levels.”
Schultz connected this directly to du Pont’s behavior at Foxcatcher, including a move du Pont referred to as the “Fox Catcher Five,” which Schultz described as du Pont grabbing wrestlers by the groin during training sessions. When du Pont once moved toward Schultz in that manner, Schultz shut it down immediately and said du Pont backed off.
“I think he got scared,” Schultz said.
