To paint or not to paint?

[Muzza_NZ]

With the RX7 finally finished we're debating whether to paint the beast. On my last 1UZ project, I found that after I painted the car, I was too scared to really use it, for fear of chipping the paint, or of some twit in the carpark opening their car door into it.

The options are:

Leave it unpainted for a while to work out the kinks, and then paint it in about 6 months once the weather warms up again.

Paint and panel it on the cheap (ie a 10 metre paint job), so that all panels are the same colour/shape and put the money saved into building a better turbo setup (instead of doing that on the cheap)

Panel and paint it shortly, so that the whole car looks completely finished (or so it looks 'pretty' as my missus says)

Don't paint it, and see how many times it gets smacked around on the track

In all cases we've got some supporters who would like to put their sign writing all over it which would somewhat disguise the second hand paint.

Here's the build thread:
http://lextreme.com/forums/showthread.php?p=92392#post92392

Some pics (from that thread)
http://lextreme.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=8204&d=1216759083
http://lextreme.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=8207&d=1216759138
http://lextreme.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=8205&d=1216759096
http://lextreme.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=8206&d=1216759113

I'm interested in your ideas and suggestions.