As you probably noticed from watching the main video, there is going to be a lot of fast picking involved with the rhythm playing. When you look at the tablature throughout the song, you'll be noticing a lot of sixteenth notes mixed with eighth notes. This mixture of fast and slow notes will help develop your rhythm playing and give you more stamina. However, you need to make sure you practice correctly, so make sure you learn these exercises at a very slow and manageable pace.
As far as Exercise 1, every note in this exercise will be heavily palm-muted except for the very last note. Make sure your picking hand rests firmly on the Low E and A strings to get the maximum crunch effect with your palm mutes.
This sequence is also in 5/4 time, so there is a span of 5 quarter notes in every measure.
Got it down? On to Exercise 2...