Armstrong pulls out of Milan-San Remo race

PARIS (Reuters) - Seven-times Tour de France champion Lance Armstrong has pulled out of Saturday's Milan-San Remo classic race because of acute gastroenteritis, his RadioShack team said on Friday.

"It would have been good to have Lance line up for the start but we prefer not to take any risk," said RadioShack manager Johan Bruyneel in a statement.

"It would not be very intelligent to let him start in a race of almost 300 km, while not being healthy."

American Armstrong, 38, will be replaced in RadioShack's roster by Fumiyuki Beppu of Japan.

(Reporting by Julien Pretot; Editing by Alison Wildey)