Possible ITB problem (long)?

I have tweaked my knee and looking online, it seems as though it might be my IT band except that I have not had pain during a run.

I first noticed some discomfort in my knee a few hours after I had a VO2 test. This test was performed for both the bike (trainer @ 67 RPM) and the run (outside). During the test, nothing out of the ordinary happened and I didn't notice any pain or discomfort. When I woke the next morning, I'd get pain bending or straightening my leg when at about the 45 degree mark while still laying on my side in bed (ie no weight on knee). When I got up and walked around, I had no pain walking at all. I also later went for a short, easy test jog and again no pain at all.

The pain is on the lateral side of my knee, just under the knee cap. The pain is slight and today is the 3'rd day and is still there, but is harder to reproduce. I can most easily reproduce it by sitting in my computer chair with my legs on the floor almost straight and then roll myself forward using my feet. I have no swelling, but I've also torn my MCL and nicked (Dr's word) my ACL in my other knee and it didn't really swell either.

Something that may be related is that one week ago I took my family to one of those "drive through" zoos which had me in the car for 6 hours. I did have some discomfort in this same knee from sitting in the car, but didn't think much of it at the time.

At this time, I'm not ready to go to a Dr or PT and my plan is to lay off running for a few more days. I do have a race this Sunday which was my first ever tri last year and was really excited to see how I've improved over the year.

Assuming this is an ITB issue, do I need to completely lay off running for a while or should I do a few easy runs and stop immediatly if I get pain during the run? If not, how do I know when I should run again?

Assuming it's not an ITB issue, what could it be? Possibly the lateral meniscus?



Sorry for such a long post.