Groin pain that lives at the inner thigh, worsens with sprinting, cutting, or forced abduction, and refuses to fully resolve despite months of physiotherapy has a way of making people feel like they are doing something wrong.

A distal iliotibial band tear rarely comes out of nowhere. Most people who search for this term have already tried the standard advice — rest, ice, foam roll, stretch, strengthen the glutes — and either the pain came back, healed slower than expected, or never fully resolved near the lateral knee where the band inserts around Gerdy's tubercle and the distal femur.