Ordinary snake locomotion depends on pressing the body sideways against fixed points. On dry dune sand there are none: push and the grain slips. Sidewinding solves this by lifting most of the body off the ground and placing two or three static contact patches at a time, rolling the point of contact along the body so that no part ever slides.
The track it leaves is diagnostic. Each imprint is a separate J-shaped or hook-shaped line, angled roughly thirty degrees away from the direction of travel, with the hook marking where the neck was set down. A trail of these in a wash is the surest field sign of the species.
The gait is efficient enough that it has been copied in robotics research, where machines using the same lifted contact pattern climb sandy slopes that defeat conventional wheels. Sidewinding is not unique to Crotalus cerastes: several unrelated desert snakes, including African horned adders and Asian sand vipers, have arrived at closely similar gaits independently.