How to Travel With a Tailgate Pad: The Easy Way to Transport Your Bikes

Planning a mountain bike road trip? Here's how to bring a tailgate pad with you—even when you're flying to your destination.

You've been riding the same trails over and over again.

You know the parking lot. You know the climbs. You know which rock you can clear and which one you probably shouldn't try again. At this point, you're ready for something new.

So you do what any group of mountain bikers would do: round up three of your best friends, book a trip to the other side of the country, and start looking for some new trails.

There's just one problem.

How do you get four bikes—and all the gear that comes with them—to your destination without turning the entire trip into a logistical nightmare?

The Perfect Bike Trip Setup

For this trip, you've decided to fly.

Once you arrive, you'll rent a full-size pickup truck. It's the perfect solution for four riders and four bikes. Everyone can pile in, the bikes can go over the tailgate, and you'll have plenty of room for helmets, riding gear, tools, food, and all the other essentials that somehow seem to multiply every time you go riding.

There's just one thing missing:

A tailgate pad.

At home, that's not a problem. Your tailgate pad probably lives on your truck, garage, or gear room. You grab it whenever you're heading to the trailhead.

But you're not driving your truck across the country.

You're flying.

And bringing a full-size tailgate pad on a plane isn't exactly convenient.

It's bulky. It's awkward. And depending on how you're traveling, it could mean checking another piece of luggage just to transport a big piece of foam and fabric.

So someone inevitably suggests the obvious solution:

"We can just use the hotel towels."

Please Don't Use the Hotel Towels

Let's be honest. We've all improvised when traveling with bikes.

A sweatshirt becomes frame protection. A sock becomes a derailleur cover. Cardboard becomes a makeshift spacer. When you're trying to pack an entire bike into a box, creativity is practically a requirement.

But using hotel towels as a tailgate pad is probably where we should draw the line.

A towel might provide a little separation between your bike and the truck, but it wasn't designed to protect a bike during transportation. It can move around, bunch up, or slide out of position. It also doesn't provide the same type of padded surface you get from a purpose-built tailgate pad.

After spending money on flights, lodging, rental trucks, and trail passes, saving a little space by wrapping your bike in a couple of hotel towels isn't exactly the place to cut corners.

So what are your options?

Bring a Tailgate Pad That Actually Travels

The good news is that you don't necessarily need to choose between a full-size tailgate pad and the hotel-towel method.

There are compact tailgate pads specifically designed to make transporting bikes easier when space matters.

That's where the COMPACT Tailgate Pad by NADIVE comes in.

The COMPACT was designed around simplicity and portability. It can transport two full-size bikes and folds down into a much smaller package when you aren't using it. 

That makes a big difference when you're trying to pack for a trip.

Instead of finding room for a full-size tailgate pad, you can pack the COMPACT pad inside your backpack or inside your bike box, depending on how you're packing everything.

One Pad. Two Bikes.

This is where the math gets really convenient for our four-person road trip.

You've got:

• 4 riders

• 4 bikes

• 1 rental truck

• 2 compact tailgate pads

Each NADIVE COMPACT is designed to carry two bikes. So two pads are enough for the entire crew.

Pack one with each bike box, fly to your destination, pick up the rental truck, and you've got a purpose-built way to transport all four bikes.

No oversized tailgate pad.

No extra luggage dedicated to bike transportation.

And no awkward conversation with the hotel front desk about why you need eight towels.

Why Compact Matters When You Travel

When you're flying with your bike, every piece of gear has to earn its place in your luggage. Bike boxes are already packed with wheels, frames, handlebars, pedals, tools, and whatever else you can squeeze into the remaining space.

The last thing you want is another oversized piece of equipment to deal with.

That's why the ability to fold a tailgate pad down matters.

The NADIVE COMPACT is designed to fold down for storage, and its compact form makes it much easier to transport than a traditional full-width pad.

When you're finished riding, fold it back up and put it away.

That's especially useful when you're dealing with a rental truck.

You don't want to spend your entire trip figuring out how to permanently install or store a massive tailgate pad. You want something you can use when you need it and pack away when you don't.

What About Long Drives?

If you're traveling a long distance to your riding destination, it's worth thinking about how you want your bikes secured.

The original COMPACT is intentionally simple and relies on the bike's weight to hold the pad in place. For riders who want additional tie-down capability, NADIVE also offers the COMPACT+ Tailgate Pad, which adds detachable straps while retaining the foldable design and two-bike capacity. 

That gives riders another option depending on how they plan to use the pad.

For a road trip involving several hours of driving, make sure your bikes are properly secured to the truck according to your equipment's instructions and take the time to check your setup before getting on the highway.

The goal is simple: protect the bikes, protect the truck, and arrive at the trailhead ready to ride.

A Tailgate Pad Doesn't Have to Be Another Piece of Luggage

Traveling with bikes already requires more planning than a normal vacation.

You've got to think about bike boxes, airline policies, tools, pedals, helmets, shoes, riding clothes, nutrition, spare parts, and everything else you might need once you're hundreds or thousands of miles from home.

Your tailgate pad shouldn't make that list harder. I actually can be easier. This pad acts as padding for your bike. Instead of throwing extra foam and cardboard to take up the empty space, this pad does all that PLUS adds extra padding to your bike while it gets tossed around by the airline employees loading up the plane.

Ready to Explore Somewhere New?

There's nothing wrong with your local trails.

But sometimes you need to load up, travel somewhere you've never ridden before, and see what the rest of the country has to offer.

The last thing you should be worrying about when you arrive is whether you remembered to bring a way to protect your bikes.

Skip the oversized luggage.

Pack a tailgate pad that was designed to travel.

The COMPACT Tailgate Pad by NADIVE  fits two bikes, folds down for easy storage, and gives traveling riders a simple way to bring a tailgate pad wherever the next adventure takes them. 

As mentioned before, the COMPACT+ Tailgate Pad is also a great option for the longer trips where extra security is crucial. It includes two Voile straps, two tailgate straps, and a mesh bag to put them in when not in use.

Pack it with your bike. Fly to the destination. Grab the rental truck. Find the trail.

The next adventure is probably farther away than your local trailhead—and your tailgate pad shouldn't be the thing that keeps you from going.