Quotes of the Day

Hundreds of spectators looked up to the sky Monday, as daredevil climber Alain Robert worked his way up the side of Dubai's 828-meter (2,716 feet) Burj Khalifa in just over six hours.

The 48-year-old hoisted himself up along the central column of the mostly glass and steel structure with ease, only using the harness tethered 100 stories above ground as a safety measure.

Wearing a harness was unusual for the veteran climber, who has climbed over 70 skyscrapers all over the world without any form of safety gear. In fact, the reassuring bit of rope for most, made the climb more stressful for Robert.

"There is huge pressure on me because I know that they have installed everything there; this is for me," he told the Toronto Sun before the climb. "There is a giant screen, 50 meters high, 30 meters long. I know everybody is going to look at me so it's a bit of — a lot of — stress in fact." The climb isn't the first crazy stunt folks have pulled off at the Burj. In 2010, two men base-jumped off the top of the building. It's also certainly not the only stunt Robert has pulled off. Just a week before, he climbed Paris's Pompidou Center.

But this was the attempt that put him in the Guinness Book of World Records as the fastest person to climb the Burj Khalifa. (via AP and the Toronto Sun)

• Christy Choi