Athletics at the 1978 Asian Games
Venue	National Stadium
Dates	14–19 December
← 1974 1982 →

The 1978 Asian Games were held in National Stadium, Bangkok, Thailand from 14 December to 19 December. The event was not sanctioned by the International Amateur Athletics Federation due to the organizers' refusal to invite Israel.

Event	Gold		Silver		Bronze
100 m details	Suchart Jairsuraparp  Thailand	10.44	Ramaswamy Gnanasekaran  India	10.60	Suh Mal-gu  South Korea	10.66
200 m details	Ramaswamy Gnanasekaran  India	21.42	Yasuhiro Harada  Japan	21.54	Anat Ratanapol  Thailand	21.59
400 m details	Abbas Laibi  Iraq	46.71	Uday Krishna Prabhu  India	46.79	Murali Kuttan  India	47.18
800 m details	Sriram Singh  India	1:48.8	Falah Naji  Iraq	1:49.7	Takashi Ishii  Japan	1:49.9
1500 m details	Takashi Ishii  Japan	3:47.5	Muhammad Younis  Pakistan	3:48.0	Ratan Singh Bhadauria  India	3:48.1
5000 m details	Hari Chand  India	14:22.0	Takao Nakamura  Japan	14:27.2	Cui Yulin  China	14:28.1
10,000 m details	Hari Chand  India	30:07.7	Robert  Burma	30:16.9	Ko Ko  Burma	30:18.4
110 m hurdles details	Wang Xunhua  China	14.28	Yoshifumi Fujimori  Japan	14.33	Satbir Singh  India	14.43
400 m hurdles details	Hassan Kadhim  Iraq	50.81 GR	Takashi Nagao  Japan	50.98	Talib Faisal  Iraq	51.24
3000 m steeplechase details	Masanari Shintaku  Japan	8:40.7 GR	Gopal Saini  India	8:44.8	Hitoshi Iwabuchi  Japan	8:46.2
4 × 100 m relay details	Thailand Anat Ratanapol Kanoksak Chaisanont Suchart Jairsuraparp Somsak Boontud	40.32	Japan Akira Harada Yasuhiro Harada Susumu Shimizu Junichi Usui	40.33	China Yuan Guoqiang Zhao Jingyu Fan Xinwen Zou Zhenxian	40.54
4 × 400 m relay details	Japan Eiji Natori Yasuhiro Harada Junichi Usui Takashi Nagao	3:08.3	India Murali Kuttan Harkamaljit Singh Uday Krishna Prabhu Sriram Singh	3:08.4	Iraq Talib Faisal Abbas Laibi Hassan Kadhim Fahim Abdul-Sada	3:09.4
Marathon details	Mineteru Sakamoto  Japan	2:15:29.7 GR	Choe Chang-sop  North Korea	2:15:57.4	Koh Chun-son  North Korea	2:16:10.3
20 km walk details	Hakam Singh  India	1:31:54.4 GR	Subramaniam Vellasamy  Malaysia	1:31:58.8	Khoo Chong Beng  Malaysia	1:33:56.8
High jump details	Takao Sakamoto  Japan	2.20	Kazunori Koshikawa  Japan	2.18	Cui Hongjun  China	2.18
Pole vault details	Tomomi Takahashi  Japan	5.10 GR	Chen Guanghui  China	5.05	Yasuhiro Kigawa  Japan	5.00
Long jump details	Suresh Babu  India	7.85	Junichi Usui  Japan	7.76	Toshihisa Yoshimoto  Japan	7.75
Triple jump details	Masami Nakanishi  Japan	16.56 GR	Zou Zhenxian  China	16.47	Zhou Jianguo  China	16.29
Shot put details	Bahadur Singh Chouhan  India	17.61	Zhao Baoqin  China	17.44	Mohammad Al-Zinkawi  Kuwait	17.40
Discus throw details	Li Weinan  China	56.26	Li Jianguo  China	55.26	Kiyotaka Kawasaki  Japan	53.32
Hammer throw details	Shigenobu Murofushi  Japan	68.26 GR	Yoji Kitano  Japan	63.96	Ji Shaoming  China	63.34
Javelin throw details	Shen Maomao  China	79.24 GR	Toshihiko Takeda  Japan	71.60	Ding Penglin  China	70.70
Decathlon details	Hisashi Iwai  Japan	7003	Prapant Srisathorn  Thailand	6833	Jin Xuewei  China	6743

Event	Gold		Silver		Bronze
100 m details	Yin Yaping  China	12.20	Yukiko Osako  Japan	12.21	Usanee Laopinkarn  Thailand	12.22
200 m details	Usanee Laopinkarn  Thailand	24.81	Lee Eun-ja  South Korea	24.99	Junko Kushibuchi  Japan	25.05
400 m details	Saik Oik Cum  Malaysia	55.09	Keiko Nagasawa  Japan	55.74	Gao Yanqing  China	56.23
800 m details	Geeta Zutshi  India	2:07.7	Jung Dong-sun  North Korea	2:07.9	Chang Yong-ae  North Korea	2:08.3
1500 m details	Kim Ok-sun  North Korea	4:18.9 GR	Geeta Zutshi  India	4:28.2	Choi Yung-ran  North Korea	4:33.3
3000 m details	Kim Ok-sun  North Korea	9:24.7 GR	Lu Hongxiang  China	9:35.4	Yang Yanying  China	9:36.5
100 m hurdles details	Dai Jianhua  China	13.95	Tamie Motegi  Japan	14.23	Xie Lizhen  China	14.55
400 m hurdles details	Chen Xin  China	1:01.32 GR	Li Sulan  China	1:01.89	Masae Kiguchi  Japan	1:02.09
4 × 100 m relay details	Thailand Usanee Laopinkarn Pusadee Sangvijit Wallapa Pinij Buspranee Ratanapol	46.20 GR	Japan Emiko Konishi Yukiko Osako Junko Kushibuchi Tomoko Maeda	46.78	Philippines Amelita Saberon Lucila Tolentino Lorena Morcilla Lydia Silva-Netto	47.00
4 × 400 m relay details	Japan Keiko Nagasawa Mayumi Kubota Tomoko Maeda Masae Kiguchi	3:46.29	China Huang Dongsheng Liang Lihua Guo Guimei Zhang Huifen	3:46.87	North Korea Jang Geun-ok Chang Yong-ae Jung Dong-sun Kim Ok-sun	3:48.78
High jump details	Zheng Dazhen  China	1.88 GR	Tamami Yagi  Japan	1.82	Yang Wenqin  China	1.80
Long jump details	Zou Wa  China	6.28	Angel Mary Joseph  India	6.05	Sumie Awara  Japan	6.05
Shot put details	Shen Lijuan  China	17.70 GR	Lü Cheng  China	16.72	Kayoko Hayashi  Japan	15.59
Discus throw details	Li Xiaohui  China	55.92 GR	Wang Dan  China	51.22	Matsuko Takahashi  Japan	47.22
Javelin throw details	Yao Ruiying  China	57.22 GR	Naomi Shibusawa  Japan	54.98	Li Xia  China	54.08
Pentathlon details	Ye Peisu  China	4133	Angel Mary Joseph  India	3837	Guo Yu  China	3731

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	China (CHN)	12	9	13	34
2	Japan (JPN)	10	15	10	35
3	India (IND)	8	7	3	18
4	Thailand (THA)	4	1	2	7
5	North Korea (PRK)	2	2	4	8
6	Iraq (IRQ)	2	1	2	5
7	Malaysia (MAL)	1	1	1	3
8	Burma (BIR)	0	1	1	2
	South Korea (KOR)	0	1	1	2
10	Pakistan (PAK)	0	1	0	1
11	Kuwait (KUW)	0	0	1	1
	Philippines (PHI)	0	0	1	1
Totals (12 entries)		39	39	39	117

• Asian Games Results. GBR Athletics. Retrieved on 2014-10-04.
• Women's relay medallists. Incheon2014. Retrieved on 2014-10-04.
• Men's relay medallists. Incheon2014. Retrieved on 2014-10-04.