The investigation of subbarrier fusion is undergoing a revival following the suggestion of a way to extract an experimental representation of the barrier distribution from the second derivative, . By performing precise measurements of fusion excitation functions one is able to extract the strength and height of the barriers, providing important information on the coupling mechanism. As an alternative approach, it has recently been proposed that the first derivative of the compound nucleus (CN) spin distribution is equivalent to . Multiplicity distributions for the reactions Mo and Pd have been measured making use of the Argonne/Notre Dame-BGO-array and GASP, respectively. In particular, the influence of fission on the high spin tail of the spin distribution and the consequences for the experimental representation of the distribution of barriers is discussed for Mo.