How the rankings work:
They take into account the tournament results for each country in a four-year cycle. So they'll always feature points from four WHCs and one olympics. However, the results from these years are not weighed equally, but there's a gradual decline - only 25% of the points earned are counted from three years ago, 50% from two years ago, 75% from the previous year and 100% from the ongoing year. In other words, the most recent outcome is given the heaviest weigh. But at the same time, consistency is rewarded somewhat.
Also, in case two countries are tied in points, higher placement in the most recent tournament is used as a tie-break.
Furthermore, for the cancelled 2020 WHC, the points were awarded according to the position in the 2019 final ranking. (The World Ranking, not the tournament table.)
I'm struggling, what did the Swiss do to move up? Did I miss a medal?
But I’m struggling with Switzerland, why are they ranked ahead of us and Czechs?
Switzerland finished ahead of Czechia in 3/5 tournaments (including the most recent one, which gives 'em the tie-break) that count towards the ranking, and ahead of Slovakia in 4/5. But it's not like the gap between these three is great - Switzerland and Czechia are actually tied in points, while Slovakia is just 20 points behind them.
But then, Switzerland/Czechia's gap to the fifth-place Sweden is 135 points, reflecting these three's position as reliable middle-tier countries that don't consistently compete for medals, however.
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