Sorry for this late answer Jon, I missed your question. I live in France. As i was 16 to 19 (that's more than 10 years ago now) I had a sponsoring with Specialized trough a local dealer. As a junior I had some good results, but not enough to continue in this sport as a pro. I still ride sometimes but I do alot of other stuff...in particular bass playing !
what you do is score the outside
you sand gently around it all
then you spray it with spray paint in even sttrokes side to side about 8-9 inches away from the body
this will make for no drips
also make sure your finger isnt stopin some paint cause that can drip off the can
not to much paint not to little and ndont spray somthing again till it is dry
i was talking to my bass teacher about this and he had two words of advice having done it himself:
1. Getting through all that paint and finish on the whole body is a bit of a bitch so its good to have an electric sander
2. alot of painted basses (especially beginner ones) are thrown together from different pieces of wood so they dont look good with a natural or trans. finish (unless you like that look)
for anyone who cares. i have started to repaint my bass with the help of hankSRay's mini guide. its a squier p-bass that was originally black that is going to become white with what i call hollow stars. right now im working on sanding it. its a pain in the butt to get that paint off but it looks kinda cool natural. honestly i was expecting plywood or some very poor quality wood. it doesnt look that bad in my opinion. ill let ya'll know how it turned out when im done.