Sweepstake Lightweight Tent Stakes (6-Pack)

The Nemo Sweepstake Lightweight Tent Stakes are slim metal tent pegs with a built-in cleaner: a tethered polymer biscuit on each stake that you slide down the shaft to swipe off mud, clay and sand before it goes in the bag. The biscuit also glows in the dark. The pack holds six stakes.

What it does

Pull a peg out of wet ground at the end of a rainy weekend in the Grampians and it comes up coated. Normally that mud goes into the peg bag, then the tent bag, then your pack. With a Sweepstake you pull the stake by its cord loop, slide the biscuit down the shaft and the dirt comes off in one swipe. Clean stake, clean bag, clean tent.

The biscuit glows after dark too. When you step out of the tent at night, the stakes around it show up, and so do the guylines tied to them. Fewer stubbed toes, fewer pegs yanked out by a stray foot in the middle of the night.

Which tents it fits

Sweepstakes work with any tent, tarp or shelter that pegs down: corners, vestibules and guy-out points. Use them as a full replacement set for a backpacking tent, or keep them for the guylines, where the glow does the most good. They pair naturally with Nemo tents like the Dragonfly, Hornet and Dagger, and just as well with any other brand.

Weight and packed size

Each stake is slim and light, with the cord loop and biscuit riding on the shaft, so a set slides into a peg bag beside the stakes that came with your tent.

Looking after it

Pull by the cord loop and twist rather than levering the stake sideways. In hard or rocky ground, start the hole with a stick or tap the head gently with a rock. Give the biscuit a few minutes of daylight or torchlight and it will glow brighter when night falls.