Freestyle swimmer Petra Priemer won two silver medals at the 1976 Montréal Olympics. She came in second behind her teammate Kornelia Ender in the 100 metres freestyle and also finished second with the East German 4x100 freestyle relay. She was scheduled for the medley relay but did not start. At the 1978 West Berlin Worlds Priemer earned another silver with the freestyle relay. One year earlier she had won a relay gold and an individual bronze in the 100 freestyle at the Jönköping Europeans.
Priemer never won an East German national title. She later studied German philology and worked with the Leipzig city and district library. After German re-unification, former East German officials admitted to administering doping to nearly all their swimmers, including Priemer. Records revealed that she was injected with testosterone.